Where No Klingon has Gone Before
by Kyosanim
Summary: Q sends a Klingon fleet to the other side of the Galaxy as part of a test, if the Klingons fail, they would be confined to their solar system forever.
1. The test

**Disclaimers: **Star Trek and Babylon 5 are not my property but property of its rightful owners. This story is for entertainment purpose only. No copyright infringement is intended and no monetary compensation has been or will be received.

**Author's note: **I tried to portrait as faithful as possible the universes of Star Trek and Babylon 5 but some changing's are inevitable due to the interaction of both shows.

This history in the universe of Star Trek happens after the movie First Contact and in Babylon 5 before the movie the Beginning.

**PS: THIS HISTORY WAS REVISED AND IS NOW ONLY A STAR TREK AND BABYLON 5 CROSSOVER**

**Since many persons complained about I adding BSG to this history and ruining it I did a major revision to this history and removed all the references to BSG and did minor corrections to all chapters.**

** -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------**

**CHAPTER 1**

WHERE NO KLINGON HAS GONE BEFORE 

It all started when the Klingon High command planned to conduct war exercises relative to a specific threat "The Borg". According to the Federation/Klingon officer exchange program a Federation officer was scheduled to incorporate a Klingon ship in those exercises so naturally the High Command requested that the officer should have experience in fighting the Borg.

**TWO WEEKS AGO.**

Brigadier Korras of the house of Malok and commanding the Klingon flagship IKS Kahless met with the Federation starship USS Excalibur that was bringing in his new temporary first officer and he was not pleased. He had seriously begun to wonder whether or not the high command was becoming senile? What could a Federation officer teach a Klingon warrior? At the very least he was expecting that this Federation officer would be a strong seasoned combatant that would at he very least project some authority, but when the transporter beam faded away, he saw standing there only a small fragile blonde female human. His first thought was that the federation was playing a joke on him.

"Brigadier Korras, Cmdr. Elizabeth Shelby reporting for duty, Sir." Shelby said with military precision.

"What is this? Is the Federation mocking us? We require a Borg expert but instead they send …… a weak female." Replied Korras.

"I resent the implication Brigadier, my gender is irrelevant, I am one of the most experienced Federation officers when it comes to the Borg!" Shelby shouted in perfect Klingon not resorting to any universal translator.

"Is that so?" With that Korras turned and strode to the door leading to the corridor. "This is not some fancy Federation ship with all the amenities you are used to Cmdr., this is a true warship with Klingon rules." Korras sneered.

"I'm aware of that Brigadier, I'm not expecting any special treatment while aboard this vessel, and I'm perfectly aware of all Klingon regulations and duties." She said bluntly.

"AH AH AH, We shall see Cmdr." Korras replied laughing.

Two weeks had passed since the arrival of Cmdr. Shelby and to the general surprise of all on board she had gained the respect of the entire Kahless crew, she worked as hard as any Klingon and ate and drank the same things they did without even the slightest hesitation, she even dealt efficiently with a challenge made by Rodek the Kahless's previous first officer.

**KLINGON SPACE; PRESENT DAY.**

After the completion of the military exercises the IKS Kahless, a Negh'Var class warship, and its task force were effortlessly traveling through the emptiness of space heading towards Federation territory so that Commander Shelby could resume her commission aboard the U.S.S. Excalibur.

Suddenly a brilliant flash of light filled the entire bridge. It slowly started to fade away until it resolved itself into what seemed to be a Klingon figure. As the bridge crew's eyes adjusted, the figure indeed appeared to be a Klingon ... dressed as a General of the Klingon Empire, a more nervous crewmember instinctively drew is disruptor. The figure gave a slight nod in his direction and a powerful wind came from nowhere hurling him with a sickening crunch against the nearest bulkhead leaving him unconscious and badly hurt. Simultaneously, all others hand weapons at the bridge vanished, then the figure turned toward Korras.

"You are notified that your kind has wandering the galaxy for far too long, you are directed to return to your own solar system immediately."

"Who dares issue orders to a Klingon?" Korras shouted.

"For your information we call ourselves "the Q"." Or you may call me that; it's all much the same thing. You lesser beings are incapable of see my true magnificence so I have presented myself to you in this form so that you may better understand me."

"You have no right to tell us what we can or cannot do." Korras replied.

"Such arrogance! What you recognize is irrelevant." To confirm his word "Q" waved his hand and from nowhere an energy barrier appeared in front of and surrounding the Klingon fleet.

"Brigadier our sensors are reading that barrier as solid." A crewmember yelled.

"Order the fleet to go to full stop." Korras ordered.

"Fleet stopping Sir" Krazj the Klingon at the helm acknowledged.

"Order the fleet to power all weapons to maximum, target that barrier and fire." Korras ordered.

"All ships are acknowledging and are ready Sir." Said Molar the gunner with a savage grin.

At the center of the bridge "Q" was finding the whole thing very amusing and said. "That is not going to do nothing but it is your time to waste."

"FIRE" Korras Yelled.

The next instant a tremendous volley of disruptor fire and torpedoes impacted the barrier; the resulting explosions were so massive that the blast waves reached for several dozens of kilometers. After all the fire dissipated, everyone was shocked to see the energy barrier still there and completely undamaged.

"I told you so." "Q" replied with a large smile in is face.

Meanwhile Cmdr. Shelby had called the ship's Doctor to attend the wounded crewmember and he was removed to the medical center.

"Brigadier" Shelby Said, "I recognize this being, he had appeared before in several

Federation vessels causing trouble and a great deal of suffering, apparently he is a near omnipotent being that likes to play with what he calls 'lesser beings'."

"Well well what do we have here?" "Q" said. He approached Shelby and began to circle around her "What is a pretty thing like you doing among these Neanderthals."

"I know all about you, and your provocations and tricks to force people to do what you want." Shelby claimed

"How pretentious of you to pretend to know me, you should worship the ground I walk, everything I did was for the benefit of your pathetic species."

"Really? How is introducing us to the Borg was for our benefit? Thousands have died and we could've being assimilated."

"Your narrow minds never cease to surprise me. You call yourselves an evolved species and yet can't grasp the bigger picture. Before the Borg you were utterly pathetic, full of yourselves in your little paradise and not bothering to looking outside, by introducing the Borg I awake you, I showed you that the universe is full of dangers and that you always must be vigilant, if it wasn't for my actions then you all would be servants of those shape-shifters today."

"Really, and if we had been assimilated by the Borg, would we be any better?" Said Shelby angrily.

"My dear," Q said, the patronizing smile never leaving his face. "The simple act of living is a dangerous proposition, you cannot improve yourselves without taking risks."

"How is being confined to our solar system going to be good for us?" Interjected Korras.

"Who would've known that he could speak and ask pertinent questions at the same time, maybe this is going to be interesting after all." Joked "Q" about Korras.

"I remember reading Captain Picard report, you did the exactly same thing to the Enterprise." Said Shelby

"Yes I did didn't I." "Q" Replied.

"Then why aren't they confined to their territory?" Asked Korras Frustrated.

"Because they passed their little test." "Q" replied cheerfully.

"We Klingons are capable of passing any test the Federation passes". Korras said with conviction.

"You Klingons are so predictable I knew you were going to say that, …let the test begin." "Q" stated then he snapped his fingers and in front of the fleet a large wormhole appeared from nowhere. "Your test is at the other side of this entrance, if you pass the test I will not bother anymore …… at least for a while." Then in a flash of light he disappeared.

"Lieutenant K'nera, order the Kempeth to go back and inform the High Command of the situation, the rest of the fleet is to follow us, we are going through that wormhole."

"Yes Sir. Transmitting the message now." The communications officer replied.

Seconds later a small Bird of Prey wheeled around 180 degrees and warped away heading toward the Klingon Home World while the rest of the fleet engaged their cloaks and glided silently as the night into the recent created anomaly.

In less than a minute their travel ended and all ships exited to normal space.

"I want to know where we are immediately." Korras ordered.

"According to star positions we are on the other side of the galaxy." Toran at Ops replied.

"Is the wormhole still there?" Asked Korras.

"Yes Sir, it isn't visible to the naked eye but our subspace sensors are able to detect it." Said Toran.

Then "Q" appeared again in is usual way. "Time is ticking Boys and Girls and I'm not going to wait forever." Then he disappeared again in a flash of light.

Then Korras turn to K'nera the communications officer. "Inform all Captains to come aboard immediately for a council of battle." Then he addressed Shelby. "Comdr. come with me to the war room and tell me all you know about this Being."

After hours of discussion Brigadier Korras, Cmdr. Shelby and all the fleet Captains decided that it was an absolute priority to gather accurate Intel of this region of space, and the best way to archive that would be by gaining information through contact with local civilizations but taking all possible precautions in case they turned out to be hostile.

"Helm plot course to 09 mark 265 at warp 8, Astrometrics indicated that the solar system situated there is a good place to start our search ……engage now." Korras ordered.

"Yes Sir." Answered Kazj at the helm.

Two days had passed since the beginning of the test and despite all scanners being set to maximum they still hadn't detect any subspace signals or warp trails and that was very disturbing. Could it be that this area of space was devoid of space faring races? But suddenly long-range sensors pick up a signal.

"Sensors just detected a powerful energy surge at coordinates 0 mark 090." Said Toran at ops.

"Specify." Said Korras

"The energy signature is unlike anything I ever saw, I'm also picking a unknown vessel it just appear from nowhere." Toran said.

"Distance?" Korras asked.

"At present speed fifteen minutes. Toran replied.

"Intercept." Korras commanded.

Minutes later the fleet exit warp and proceeded to its target at full impulse.

"Tactical." Korras commanded

Immediately the Main viewscreen changed from the forward view to a virtual representation of the surround area with all kinds of information displayed in it like distance to target, its dimensions, speed, energy readings, weapons layout, hull composition and in this case lack of shields, warp core and artificial gravity.

"Hail them." Korras ordered.

Several moments passed without any reply.

"How dare they not reply to us, we should destroy them for that insult." Spouted an enrage Mollar.

"Relax lieutenant we don't know if they can receive our hails." Said Shelby trying to calm down a tense situation.

"Enough." Shouted Korras. "K'nera are they receiving our hails or not?"

"Hard to confirm Sir I'm not even detecting a subspace receiver in that ship … wait, in another bandwidth I'm detecting tachyon emissions coming from them."

"They are attacking us." Said Molar

"No." Replied K'nera. "The emissions are highly modulated and are using a very high bandwidth … Sir I believe this is their equivalent to our subspace transmissions."

"Can you confirm that Lieutenant?" Ordered Korras.

"I can Sir, I must reconfigure our main communications array and we should be able to receive those transmissions."

"Precede Lieutenant." Korras said.

Moments later. "I did it Sir, but for the moment it is audio only."

"Put it on the speakers." Korras commanded.

"On speakers Sir."

"**_This is the ship Kullenbrak from the Brakiri Alliance please identify yourselves … I repeat this is the ship Kullenbrak from the Brakiri Alliance please identify yourselves we are in neutral space and we don't have any hostile intentions…"_**

"Attention Brakiri ship I'm Brigadier Korras from the House of Malok of the Klingon Empire we wish to exchange information with you."

"**_We never heard of a Klingon race, where are you from? What information do you want to trade?"_**

"We come from very far, many thousands of light years distant, we wish to know more of this region of space

"**_We know nothing about you or your intentions, what can you offer us for that information?"_**

"I can give you my word of honor that we don't have hostile intentions against you, what do you want to trade for the information?"

"**_Words don't mean anything, for that kind of information we need something really valuable." _**

Brigadier Korras wasn't known for his patience and this alien was stretching it to the point of rupture. Questioning his honor was the last straw.

"You dare questioning my honor? You are going to pay with your live for it … Gunner target them, power main disruptors and prepare to fire at my command."

"After hearing that last order, the blood of the Brakari captain almost froze in his veins. He had seen in his ship's instruments the powerful energy readings that all the alien ships were emanating, especially the big one. It was an absurdity for a ship of that size, not even the Minbari Sharlins put out that much of a power signature, and when the guns the alien called disruptors were activated, the energy levels almost doubled. As if that wasn't enough, his ship was outnumbered six to one.

"**_Wait wait, I didn't mean to insult you I'm very very sorry, you misunderstood my words. Please don't fire, I'm willing to give you the information you want for free." _**

"Make the data available immediately and prepare to be boarded, the slightest resistance will be met with deadly force." Then Korras made a signal to cut the connection... "Comdr Shelby take a squadron of marines and board them, bring me that data, don't tolerate any resistance is that understood?"

"Perfectly Sir, … May I make a small suggestion Sir?"

"What is it?"

"Sir I think the alien has repented enough in questioning your honor, he already apologize to you repeatedly, I think if we make a small gesture here, it may go a long way in solidifying a positive image of the Klingon Empire among the local races. Besides, antagonizing the species in this area will only make completing Q's test all the more difficult.

Korras thought for a moment than said. "What do you suggest?"

"They're not very advanced technologically, they don't even have artificial gravity, maybe we could give them a portable anti-gravity generator, and we have plenty of those to spare."

"Make it so Cmdr."

Minutes later aboard the Brakiri ship its crewmembers were very uneasy not knowing what to expect from the aliens that were about to board their ship or how their appearance would be.

For now the only thing they could do was wait for the arrival of the aliens' shuttle and hope for the best.

Suddenly columns of light started appearing all over the place and soon those columns of light began to coalesce into humanoid creatures. Almost all of them were above two meters in height and were wearing thick body armor with spikes in the shoulders, arms, and legs, not to mention huge guns and blades, their ridged foreheads and large teeth could put fear in bravest Brakiri. To their complete surprise, a small human female was accompanying these creatures. She also wore a totally different suit. It was black all over except for the shoulders where it was grey. In addition, a small band of red curved around her neck and on it was three gold circles. Amazingly the lack of gravity aboard the ship appeared not to affect any of them including the human. It was as if their white boots were gluing them to the floor.

The human female was the one to take the lead.

"I'm Commander Elisabeth Shelby where is the captain of this vessel?"

"From the back of the room a timid Brakiri appeared and start floating in her direction.

"I 'm captain Jayosh Korthek, I'm very sorry for the misunderstanding regarding the great Brigadier Korras From the House of Malok of the Klingon Empire."

"You should be sorry," said Shelby with a slight grin. The Brigadier takes his honor deadly seriously. Now, lets move past that incident because we have not time to waste. Please take me to your terminal so that I can download the data requested."

"Of course please follow me."

While the Brakiri Captain floated towards the ships' terminal he noted that among the alien crowd following him one was carrying a large silver plated cylindrical object about a meter long. The word bomb flashed unbidden across his mind.

"This is it." The Brakiri captain said pointing to a grey and black computer console.

With increasing anxiety the Brakiri watched the Human female remove a device from her waist then open it in half. She waved the device above the terminal for several seconds than the terminal lit up and the data contained in it start passing trough the terminal screen at an incredible speed, obviously that strange device was downloading that data into it

A few moments later the human closed the device and put it back on her waist, signaling the alien carrying the cylindrical object he put it on the floor. The Brakiri captain's heart almost stopped. Then the Human female addressed him.

"We have finished our work here, and despite your rudeness to Brigadier Korras he decided to be magnanimous and forget the incident.

Your technology is very primitive by our standards; you are not even capable of generating artificial gravity, so as token of good faith the Brigadier decided to offer you this gravity generator. All you have to do is push this red button and regulate the level of gravity by moving this knob up or down, its maximum radius is 500 meters.

The Brakiri Captains jaw almost hit the floor. Only a few scant seconds before he was certain he was going to die a painful death but instead these strange aliens were giving him a piece of technology he could only dream about a few hours ago.

"We are amazed with the Brigadiers generosity I must thank him personally."

"That is not required or advisable we just ask that in the future you and you people remember how generous the Klingon Empire can be and be careful how you talk to future first contacts.

Then Shelby tapped her badge. "Shelby to Kahless, we are ready to return."

Then as suddenly as they appeared, they were gone, fading away in columns of light.

TBC


	2. Another Earth

**CHAPTER 2**

**Aboard the Kahless.**

After stepping out of the transporter pad, Shelby headed to the bridge of the Kahless.

"I see you have arrive Cmdr did they give you any trouble?" asked Korras.

"No Sir I am certain that in the future the last thing the Brakiri are going to do is question Klingon honor."

"Good … now give me the data you retrieved. I will go to my quarters and analyze it, you have the command chair."

"Yes Sir, and where will we go?"

"Back to our previous destination Cmdr." Korras replied.

Moments later the Klingon fleet went to warp leaving the Brakiri behind, and if they were not impressed so far, then the sight of the Klingon fleet turning and accelerating to the speed of light in less than a second did the trick.

**Aboard the Brakiri ship**. 

"If the humans have associated themselves to those beings than I believe the Minbari are in for a lot of trouble." The Brakiri Captain casually commented to a crewmember next to him.

Several hours after seeing the Brakiri data, Korras decided to have another conference to delineate the next course of action.

"In this region of space, no one uses or has even heard of warp drive. Instead, everyone uses something called either jump gate or jump engine for interstellar travel. It seems this method of FTL is achieved by using a substance called Quantium 40 to open a vortex to a dimension they call hyperspace. We must study this method of traveling and determine what strategic value it has or if it has any advantages over warp drive. Additionally, the main races we may encounter here are the Minbari, the Centauri, the Narn and some sort of local United Federation of Planets they call League of Nonaligned Worlds of whom those Brakiri are part."

Korras paused and glanced around the table before continuing. "In addition there is an unexpected surprise. Apparently, there is a race known as humans here. But even more surprisingly is that their Home-world is also known as Earth

Sounds of astonishment were heard in the room. "Humans here this far? ... It is impossible must be a trick of some sort." Shouted Captain Kreen of the IKS B'moth

"Yes I also find this very disturbing." Korras said. "What do you have to say about this Cmdr?

"I'm as puzzled has you Sir," Replied Shelby. "In the past century several other duplicated Earths with Humans on them were found in the Alpha quadrant. We found out later that an ancient race we called the Preservers were responsible for that but what their intentions in doing that were, we never found out. The fact that there is another duplicated Earth this far is a complete surprise."

"Duplicated Earths? … That is impossible! How is it that I have never heard of this before?" Asked Captain Marlok of the IKS Qo'nos

"We usually don't put neon signals saying, to see a duplicate of Earth go this way besides those planets were and still are pre-warp civilizations. We thought it was better to leave them alone until they were ready." Said Shelby

"Bahh Federation morality at is best." Kreen said.

"Anything more we should know Sir?" Shelby asked trying to ignore the last remark.

"Yes there is Cmdr, apparently these humans are not very advanced technologically. They only began traveling through the stars in the last hundred years."

"And in that time fought a war against a race called the Dilgar and are now at war with a race called Minbari. The Minbari are much more advanced than the Humans. The Humans are losing the war badly. Do you think this is the test that "Q" talked about Cmdr? For us to save the Humans?" Asked Korras

Before Shelby could answer "Q" appeared in a flash of light startling the remaining Klingon Captains that had not meet "Q" before."

"Did I just hear someone mention my little name?" Asked "Q"

"Is this the being called "Q"? …It doesn't appear to be that impressive." Marlok stated.

"Impressive you say, do you want to be impressed? Then how about an Antican desert raptor." In a flash of light "Q" turn himself into a something similar to a Earth dinosaur covered with large thick scales, teeth measuring almost a meter of length, a long bifid tongue and large eyes red as fire, then another flash of light, and the raptor disappeared only to once again become the Klingon "Q", "How about a Ligonian sea serpent do you want one of those? Asked "Q" with a devious smile in is face

"N...o is e... enough." Said Marlok stuttering.

"That's good, now what do we have here? Are we brainstorming? It must be difficult with all those unicellular brains of yours."

"Stop insulting us, do you want us to help the Humans? Is that your test?" An angered Korras asked.

"If I told you what the test is that would be cheating and you don't want to do that do you? After all there's no honor in cheating. One thing I can tell you and is that so far I'm not impressed with what you have done, almost three days passed and you're still wandering around like a headless Targ without knowing what to do, an Andorian slug would have solved the test by now." Then "Q" Looked to is wrist and in a flash of light an hourglass appeared strapped to it. "Look at the time I have to go now I'm late to a meeting. Next time I come I better see some progress ta ta."

Then "Q" snapped his fingers and disappeared.

"I'd pay real money not to see him again." Muttered Shelby

"What are we going to do Sir?" Asked Kovlor of the IKS K'tara

"We are going to proceed to Human space and it is better for those Minbari don't get in our way because In the mood I am in it would be very bad for them, dismissed." Korras commanded darkly.

Moments later the fleet altered its course and headed towards Earth Alliance territory.

Almost a day had passed and tension on the bridge crew was so high it could be felt on the other side of the ship.

Suddenly four vortices appeared in the path of the Klingon fleet.

"Sir four vortices forming dead ahead and four unknown ships are exiting … sensors read those ships as organic and a thousand meters long each." Toran said.

"What? On screen:" commanded Korras.

Immediately in the screen appeared four almost cylindrical ships with four converging structures at the front.

"Sir we are receiving an audio signal from the lead vessel." Said K'nera

"On speakers." Said Korras.

There was an ethereal chime like sound that whispered from the speakers before the words **_"Go back."_**

"We do not take orders from no one, identify yourselves immediately" Shouted an angered Korras.

"**_The circle must not be broken, go back or you will be destroyed."_** The voice repeated again in the same musical tone.

Green tendrils of energy began to emanate from the struts of the strange ships. They converged in the center with a decidedly menacing look.

"Sir, power readings from those ships just increased exponentially. I believe those are weapons ready to fire." said an agitated Toran at Ops.

"BATTLE ALERT, RAISE SHIELDS AND POWER ALL WEAPONS…. EVASIVE." Brigadier Korras commanded in a loud voice.

As soon as the six Klingon ships started maneuvering the Vorlon's unleash their deadly energy beams. The Kahless lost forty percent of its shields from the first blast. The Ykir, a Bird of Prey, was completely obliterated even with its shields at maximum and the K'tara a k'T'inga class ship lost all forward shields and took heavy damage. The remaining vessels cart wheeled wildly through space and managed to avoid being hit.

The Klingon response was equally deadly. The Kahless with its two super disruptors and eight forward disruptors plus a volley of torpedoes cleaved into the lead Vorlon ship almost tearing it in half. The remains immediately lost power and began to drift.

Three other Klingon ships with several volleys of torpedoes and disruptor fire hit another Vorlon. A lucky shot unintentionally hit its main gun at the moment it was powering up. The resultant explosion reduced the Vorlon dreadnaught to atoms. The remaining two Vorlon ships were also hit but the damage was only light. They twisted violently around and unleashed a furious assault on the badly damaged K'tara. Already badly damaged, it was easy prey and quickly died under the combined onslaught. The Qo'nos, a Vor'Cha, managed to avoid a full blast but almost lost its shields. By now the Kahless and the B'Moth, another Vor'Cha, were firing against the Vorlon ship that had manage to destroy the IKS K'tara and were taking vengeance on behalf of the fallen ship.

Meanwhile the remaining Klingon ship the Pak't Marr, also a k'T'inga class, hit the last remaining Vorlon ship that had been hit previously was now with some moderate damage. It was still deadly, and in a surprisingly fast maneuver it managed to avoid more incoming disruptor fire and fired towards the Kahless. The energy weapons cascaded across her shields eliminating them. It then accelerated at an incredibly speed opened a jump point and disappeared in seconds.

The remaining Klingon ships turned and closed in on the drifting Vorlon ship.

**Kahless Bridge**

"Sir I'm detecting an overload at the enemy ship." Toran shouted.

"What? Warn the fleet, helm get us out of here any direction maximum speed NOW." Korras commanded.

In seconds all four ships appeared to stretch to the infinity and in bright flashes of light were gone. Little more than one second later, the Vorlon ship blew itself apart.

Meanwhile a board the Kahless an enraged Brigadier Korras was issuing orders.

"I want all ships cloaked at all times, …Lieutenant K'nera I want all captains and first officers aboard immediately for a tactical briefing, … Cmdr follow me." Then they went to the war room.

**War room.**

"That battle was a total disgrace. In all my years I never saw such incompetence, raw recruits would have fought with more skill. You have brought dishonor to your houses." Vociferated an enraged Korras

"Sir the enemy was unknown to us we didn't have any tactical data about them." Marlok responded.

"Enough excuses." Korras said pounding in the table. "From now on I want battle drills around the clock is that understood?"

"YES SIR." Responded all in unison lowering their heads.

"The first officer that scores below average in the exercises is going to be executed personally by me … DISMISSED." Shouted a Korras so enrage that seemed as if his head was about to explode.

Light years away events began to pick up speed.

**Location: Hyperspace.**

Hundreds of Minbari vessels of all types were heading to finish what had begun only a few short years before. The mission was simple; eliminate all traces of the race called Humans.

In the center of the massive Sharlin class vessel of the Grey Council, nine hooded figures were standing in a low-lit room watching a holographic image. The view displayed was magnificent, hundred of ships spread across hyperspace.

Suddenly a flash of light broke the serenity of the room. When it faded away there was another hooded figure. He removed the hood and although the figure appeared to be Minbari all in the council of nine knew that being wasn't.

"Greetings fellow council members did I came in time for the big moment?" "Q" asked displaying a large smile.

One of the council of nine advanced a few steps and asked.

"You are not a Minbari, what are you?"

"Of course I'm not a Minbari, how can such a wonderful, ravishing, magnificent and intelligent being like my self be mistaken to such an inferior creature. I only adopted this disgusting form so that your limited senses could understand me."

"Are you a First One?" The confused Minbari asked.

"A first one! Please don't insult me by comparing me to those presumptuous creatures, I'm

"Q" from the Q Continuum, I'm as far above those you call First Ones as they are beyond a microbe."

Suddenly two Vorlons swept majestically into the room and almost all Minbari present were shocked by their presence aboard.

"_Leave the young ones, they don't belong to you."_ Said a Vorlon

"_The circle must be complete."_ The other said.

"How melodramatic of you, don't you feel hot inside those shells?" "Q" asked, "Maybe I should remove them." "Q" Stated and start to wave is hand.

"_STOP"_ Shouted both Vorlons.

"You two almost reminded me of a Human musical group so tuned is your singing." Joked "Q"

"Alright for now you can keep those horrible things, but don't tempt me." "Q" stated.

The Minbari council was without words to describe the scene. This creature called "Q" had the audacity to threaten the powerful Vorlons and, frighteningly, they were doing nothing to stop it, also another intriguing subject was how the Vorlons came on board? For all the members of the Grey Council except to Delenn it was a mystery.

"Well, here you are all set to arrive at your destiny and Dumb and Dumber here." "Q" pointed to the Vorlons. "Already broke some rules so I suppose its okay for me to do the same." Then he waved his hand and all Minbari ships were unceremoniously flung from hyperspace and into the middle of a nebula.

"**_Reverend council the fleet just exited hyperspace but we are not in the Humans solar system but inside a nebula, … additionally, our sensors are picking up several large structures ahead."_** A voice said over a speaker. In the room a holographic display focused on the structure. It was much disorganized and was composed of thousands of modules of all sizes and shapes.

"What is that?" A Minbari asked.

"You are going to find out soon." A cheerful "Q" said with a large, almost predatory, grin.

"_An unknown vessel is approaching at great speed … it is cube shaped."_ Was heard over the speaker.

Then the cube approached the nearest Minbari ship.

"**_We are being scanned. The alien ship is ignoring our hails."_** The voice on the speaker said.

Then the cube emitted a green beam towards the scanned Minbari ship and the hull start being cut and then tractored away.

"**_Our ship the Denn'sha is being attacked."_** Stated the voice over the Speaker.

The response of the Minbari ship was quick and efficient. All of their cannons fired upon the cube destroying almost a quarter of it. The cube immediately stopped its attack.

Seconds later another cube began to approach and stopped near the other cube.

Then another voice came over the speakers. It was very different from the previous voice. This new voice sounded metallic and sent a cold chill deep into the souls of all Minbari hearing it.

_**"We are the Borg. Deactivate your weapons and surrender your ships. We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our own. Your culture will adapt to service us. Resistance is futile."**_

This time several Minbari ships fired simultaneously. After a few moments they discontinued the attack. There was abject shock throughout the Minbari fleet as the Borg vessel was completely undamaged.

"Delightful aren't they." Stated "Q" "I have to go now, but before I go me sincerely wish you all the luck in the universe because you are going to need it." Then "Q" disappeared.

TBC


	3. Resistance is futile

**CHAPTER 3**

It was shocking that the new cube ship could survive such a devastating counter-attack but Minbari don't give up. They had hundreds of battle ready warships crewed by the best warriors. A thousand years ago they had defeated the shadows so it would take more than some ridiculous cube ships to defeat them.

All the Minbari ships immediately started vectoring for the cubes and unleashing upon them the full fury of their powerful weapons that had served them so well in the past.

Hundreds of beams impacted the hulls of the cubes and soon damage could be seen to appear, but the enemy reply was overwhelming. Green cutting beams had started pouring from all over and each shot had a devastating effect. The powerful Minbari warships were completely obliterated with single shots. Then something more horrifying began to happen. Dozens upon dozens of the ships started reporting that hundreds of alien beings were appearing out of thin air on board their ships.

Initially, the Minbari could easily kill these grotesque aliens that seemed to be part machine and part living being. Then some type of energy barriers had started to cover them and slowly entire ships had started to be overrun. As if this wasn't bad enough, it appeared as though previously dead Minbari were being resurrected and covered with metallic parts such as the enemy had, and they were fighting their fellow Minbari.

One Alyt commanded his ship to open a jump point inside the semi-destroyed cube that surprisingly had started reconstructing itself. As had always been the case when that tactic was used, the cube was destroyed in an apocalyptic explosion. After having seen this always-successful tactic work, another Alyt commanded his ship to do the same and soon the other cube was also destroyed.

Almost half an hour had passed since the beginning of the battle and the Minbari fleet had won but the price was staggeringly high. Over two hundred and fifty ships from a total of eight hundred had been lost.

Suddenly two more cubes appeared. They were very different from the previous ones. The hulls were armored and following them was another very different vessel. Its configuration resembled a distorted and malevolent diamond.

Against these new vessels the jump point tactic was promptly used again. Several Minbari ships start powering jump engines and focusing their energies into the enemy craft trying to open the jump points that would destroy them again. This time, the emitted energies when entering in contact with the Borg ships were deflected back causing a catastrophic failure in the Minbari ships jump engines and causing massive destruction. Stubbornly other ships tried the jump point tactic but the result was always the same. Soon it became clear that this old and successful tactic wasn't a valid option any more.

The course of the battle changed immediately. In a few short minutes half of the Minbari fleet was destroyed or under enemy control. There was so much surrounding destruction that the Minbari ships had difficulty coordinating their attacks, still the Minbari stayed and fought. They would rather die than run from battle. Meanwhile inside the Minbari command ship the two Vorlons unexpectedly addressed the Grey Council.

"_We must return." _One Vorlon said.

"_The Circle must remain unbroken." _Said the other Vorlon

"Are you asking us to run from this battle?" asked a member of the nine.

"_The light must prevail." _The first Vorlon said.

"But we fought the Shadows, we are the bearers of the light we must not run from this battle. Surely you can see that these abominations must be Shadow servants, we must prevail at all cost." Another member of the Grey Council said.

"_Much is at risk, you do not comprehend."_ Again the second Vorlon said.

"_Much must be done, WE MUST GO NOW." _Spouted a enrage Vorlon in a threatening tone

A confuse Minbari start walking towards a nearby console and pressed a button.

"Alyt Durhan this is Satai Coplann we are leaving, order the fleet to jump now."

Voice on speaker**. _"Satai are you commanding that we run from battle? There are thousands of Minbari trapped on boarded ships, we cannot leave them behind."_**

"You will do as I command." said Coplann.

As the combatant Minbari ships successively received the go order they grudgingly began to disengage from battle. Opening hundreds of jump points and entering hyperspace. They left behind not only an indescribable scene of wreckage and destruction but many fellow Minbari trapped in assimilated Minbari ships left to a destiny worse than death.

**Meanwhile in the Beta Quadrant: **

The IKS Kempeth reached Qo'nos and informed the Klingon High Council of the past events. At first Chancellor Martok and the High Council were skeptical on the events, but the visual evidence recorded by the Kempeth's sensors and the visual log of the Kahless Bridge was overwhelming proof.

Needless to say that the High Council went overboard and quickly assembled the largest number of ships possible on such short notice with orders to go through the wormhole.

The Kahless Bridge records had shown Cmdr. Shelby stating that the "Q" Being had previously appeared on Federation ships, namely the Enterprise, where Ambassador Worf was serving.

Immediately Starfleet Command was contacted and was asked that Ambassador Worf be informed of the situation for if possible provide any assistance he could with his expertise on this "Q" Being.

Soon after Starfleet Command informed the Klingon High Council that the USS Enterprise carrying Ambassador Worf had been diverted to meet the Klingon fleet and provide any assistance possible.

**Location: Alpha Quadrant.**

Captain's log Stardate 52080.3, the Enterprise has just arrived at the indicated rendezvous point and we are waiting the arrival of General Tanas so that as requested by the Klingon High Council Ambassador Worf could be transported to the General's ship, because of Ambassador Worf previous encounters with "Q" the Klingon Council believes that his advice will be helpful, additionally Starfleet also informed the Klingon Council that the Enterprise would be ready to provide any aid they deemed necessary but so far we haven't received any reply from them regarding this matter.

"Mr. Data you are certain that no Klingon ships have yet arrived?" Picard asked.

"Positive Captain, I verified in tripled all the sensors they are function within normal parameters, there is no signal of any Klingon ship in the…" but before Data could finish the sentence the space in the front of the Enterprise shimmered and a massive fleet of warships appeared from thin air.

"There must be more than two hundred ships out there." Riker exclaimed in astonishment.

"Two hundred and fifty four ships to be precise Commander." Data answered.

"Klingons never make things small do they Worf." Deanna Troy joked looking at Worf standing next to her.

"You are correct Counselor, contrary to others we Klingons do not think small." Worf answered pretending be offended by the remark, but all that knew him could tell that it was not the case.

"Hail them Mr. Data." Picard commanded.

"Communications are open Sir." Said Data after taping in the controls in front of him, them the main screen image changed from the forward view showing the Klingon fleet to the image of General Tanas.

"Greetings General, we arrived as quickly as possible, Ambassador Worf is ready to be transported to your ship and as Starfleet already informed the Klingon Council the Enterprise is also ready to provide any assistance possible.

"That is not necessary Captain we Klingons can solve our own problems so let's not waste more time speaking, the sooner the Ambassador Worf comes aboard the sooner we can go our way." Tanas answered

Then Worf addressed to Tanas. "General, This ship and its crew had more contact with "Q" than anyone that I know. I think it is unwise to discard the Enterprise's aid so I ask that you reconsider and accept Captain Picard offer."

The face of Tanas showed great discomfort because of this request. "I think that with your help no further aid is necessary Ambassador."

But Worf was not ready to give up. "I must insist General."

"As you wish Ambassador, let's not waste more time and end this meaningless conversation." Said an irritated General then he ended the communication and the main screen change back to showing the familiar forward view.

"Mr. Worf we all appreciate your faith in this ship and crew but if our offer of help will be the cause of problems I…" Before Picard could finish Worf interrupted him.

"It will not cause any problems Captain, as I said before your help will be appreciated." Then Worf headed to the turbolift to go to the transporter room.

Minutes later the entire Klingon fleet and the Enterprise warped in the direction of wormhole created by "Q".

**Location: Delta Quadrant.**

A very unusual event could be seen in orbit of Centauri Prime, a Minbari warship was orbiting the planet; several hours ago the Grey Council informed the Emperor Turhan of their imminent arrival and had demanded a hearing with him but the strangest thing it was the Minbari insistence that between the Minbari shuttle landing place and the Emperor quarters there couldn't be anyone in sight, and so it was done.

Minutes later the Minbari shuttle landed near the entrance of the Centauri Imperial palace and after the door opened four figures exit from it, two were dressed in grey with their heads covered by hoods the other two figures were much different and appear to be in some sort of large body armor, moments later they entered the quarters of a very nervous Emperor Turhan

"I'm very honored to have you in my modest quarters what can the Centauri do for you?" The Centauri Emperor asked.

Some ethereal sounds were heard as one of the Vorlons with the lighter color in his environmental suit advanced. The iris in his head widened and he said.

"_The circle is being disrupted the light must prevail or the darkness will destroy everything."_

"Can you be a little more explicit?" Turhan asked.

"_The future is in danger, actions must be taken and the forces of darkness must be fought." _The Vorlon said again.

"What forces of darkness are those and what have they done?" Turhan asked.

"_Who is not with the light must perish." _Was the answer then both Vorlons turned around and glided out from Turhan's quarters.

Then one Of the Minbari dressed in Grey said. "The Centauri must choose if they are with the light or the darkness, time is running out what is your choice?"

The Centauri Emperor didn't know what to say, he didn't have the courage to oppose the Minbari and what he suspected to by First Ones but he also didn't want to go to war without knowing what was happening.

"Can't you elaborate a little more? Who is the enemy, what have they done?" Turhan asked to the remaining Minbari.

"You must gather your forces and join us in the light or both the Centauri and the dark forces will be destroyed." Having said that the two Minbari also exit and minutes later the shuttle took off leaving behind a desperate Emperor.

TBC


	4. Unexpected arrival

**CHAPTER 4**

**Location: Earth Alliance Territory. **

Five days had passed since the last ordeal and saying that many battle drills had been made since the battle with the unknown organic ships was an understatement.

By now they already had entered what was called Earth Alliance territory, many metal debris had been detected clearly indicating past battles, but the absence of fleets or defense patrols was intriguing, could be that these Earthlings had no idea whatsoever how to conduct a war, if this was the case it was not surprising that they were losing the war badly for the Minbari despite the technological difference.

"Sir we are approaching this humans solar system." K'nera informed.

"Any ships detected?" asked Korras.

"None Sir." K'nera answered.

Korras remembered that the Brakiri data also informed that the Minbari was in a war of extermination thus he interrogated himself if they would not have arrived to late and the Minbari had already achieved its objective, but even if that wasn't the case he still wasn't certain what only four Klingon ships could do against an entire race with possibly thousands of ships.

"Tactical." Commanded Korras.

The main viewscreen immediately changed from the forward view to a virtual representation of the approached solar system with its corresponding data displayed on it.

Korras was not an expert in the sector 001 of the Federation but apparently this other Human Solar system situated in the Delta Quadrant appear to be an exact replica, all nine planets and its moons even the asteroids belt, what have the human beings of so special so that omnipotent beings want to go to the trouble of spreading them through the galaxy and creating Earth duplicates, it didn't make any sense, of course to Klingons credit other omnipotent beings as the "Q" also showed interest in them, but Korras was not certain that having the attention of these beings were a good thing, perhaps it was better if only the humans have this kind of attention.

"Sir we almost pass the exterior planets." Informed Toran.

"Good, at my command the fleet is to drop from warp and proceed at maximum impulse." Said Korras.

"Sir I'm detecting around the third planet many ships of all the sizes and forms, the majority are very small probably short range fighters, but same are very large and clearly warships but the rest can hardly qualify as war capable.

"Battle alert." Commanded Korras.

Immediately the bridge illumination turned from a dim white color to a red one bathing the entire bridge.

"Drop to impulse now, only the Kahless is to uncloak …raise shields and prepare to hail them." Was ordered.

On the outside like a ghost a single ship appeared from nowhere and at an incredible speed approached Mars and then passed it.

**Location: Around Earth Orbit.**

"Sir, Mars defense system is detecting an unknown ship approaching at high speed." A crewmember said to its superior officer, General Lefcourt.

"Lieutenant transfer the data to my console." Lefcourt commanded.

"Transferring now Sir."

Displaying in the screen of the console appeared a undefined profile of the unknown ship, for Lefcourt that was not a total surprise, he was accustomed to see Minbari ships in this way but the speed this ship was traveling was anything but normal, he didn't remember any Minbari ship ever traveling that fast.

"How much time before this ship arrives?" Lefcourt Asked.

"The Mars defense system did not obtain an accurate reading and the ship is emanating too much interference but by estimating of how fast it passed by Mars it was traveling around half the speed of light, at that speed it will arrive here in approximately eleven minutes." The crewmember answered.

"The fleet is to go to red alert ... give me fleet wide communications." Lefcourt commanded.

"Yes Sir." Answered the crewmember, then he pressed some keyboard keys and flipped some switches. "You have fleet wide communications now Sir."

"ATTENTION: you all know why we are here, because of a tragic incident the Minbari declared war on Earth, we made everything in our power to rectify this error, inclusively offering our unconditional surrender but that was not enough for the Minbari so they decided that because of that error we were savages and that the humanity had to pay the ultimate price and be eliminated, no another race wanted to help us, so we were left alone against a superior enemy, during two years we fought them for every meter of the space but in the end we were pushed back until finally the only thing left for us is doing one last stand for humanity.  
I don't have any doubts that you all are going to do your best in defending the planet below us and trying to protect its billions of innocents souls there that were condemned to death by an alien race, Mars defense system detected a single ship coming our way, possible its a Minbari scout to assert our defenses so prepare yourselves.

Starfuries take your positions… all other ships power up, the enemy is going to be here in minutes … we may go down but we are going to go down fighting in the name of Humanity. And may God be with us all."

**Aboard the IKS Kahless.**

"Sir, the Humans are deploying their fleet." Stated Toran.

"They may be mistaken us with the Minbari." Stated Shelby.

"We don't look nothing like those Minbari Cmdr." Responded Korras.

"Sir their technology is very primitive they cannot scan their enemies or even target them our shields may be producing similar interferences to Minbari ECM." Said Shelby hoping this was the truth, the other explanation was that these Humans might have become paranoiac due to this war and were going to shoot at everything that moved.

Korras thought for some moments. "Full stop drop shields set sensors to maximum I don't want to be surprised…hail them."

Several hundred thousand kilometers ahead around Earth orbit.

"Sir the incoming Ship is slowing down and deactivated its stealth system." The First Officer said to Lefcourt.

General Lefcourt didn't know any more what to expect, he was now clearly seeing the ship in his display, and it didn't resemble anything he ever saw.

"Sir we are being hailed." Another crewmember said.

"What? Put it on screen." Lefcourt commanded.

"**_Attention Humans this is Brigadier Korras from the House of Malok of the Klingon Empire, power down your weapons we came in peace."_**

The expression in Lefcourt face after seeing the alien displayed in the screen was of incredibility, this alien who called itself Brigadier Korras was from a race never seen before, and of all the possible moments this was the worse one for a first contact attempt.

"I am General Lefcourt Commander of Earth Alliance fleet, I never seen your race before, what is your purpose and where is your Home-world located" Lefcourt asked.

**_"Our _****_Home-world is tens of thousands of light years far from here, we were in a voyage of exploration when we found a local race called Brakiri, with them we learned that humans also exist in this part of space, so we decide to establish contact with you." _**Korras said.

"What you do you mean with that humans also in this part of space, where else could we exist." A suspicious Lefcourt asked.

**_"There are also Humans from where we came." _**Replied Korras

"That is impossible, you just claimed that your territories were tens of thousands of light years far from here and we humans never traveled that far."

**_"Obviously you are incorrect." _**Then Korras made a signal and in the screen appeared a human female dressed in a strange grey uniform.

**_"Greetings my name is Commander Elizabeth Shelby, I'm currently assigned to the Klingon Imperial fleet and I come from the United Federation of Planets that as Brigadier Korras said is situated near the Klingon Empire."_**

Lefcourt was almost speechless. "I never heard of this Federation of yours, how where humans able to arrive that far? And when did this happen?"

**_"It is a very long history to say through the radio General, would be better if we meet, then I would answer to all your questions."_** Shelby said.

"That is not possible, we are expecting an attack from the Minbari at any moment, but for curiosity why is that a human belonging to this Federation of Planets is aboard a ship belonging to another race, doesn't the Federation have its own ships" Asked Lefcourt.

**_"Yes we have our own _****_ships General, but the Federation and the Klingon Empire are allies, so both our governments decided that in order to provide a better understanding between our races sometimes we should exchange officers." _**Shelby said as if was the most natural thing in the universe.

"It is unheard of Humans working on board alien ships." Lefcourt said, disdaining such a preposterous idea. "Regardless of from where you came this is not the best moment, as I said before we are at war, and our enemies can arrive at any moment so we can't be distracted with such futility as a first contact." Lefcourt answered to Shelby in rough tone.

**_"Perhaps we can negotiate a cease fire between you and your enemies." _**Shelby said.

"That is not likely, the Minbari sworn not to stop until the human race is extinguished." Lefcout replied.

**_"If this race you call Minbari have sworn not to stop fighting until your complete extermination then they are truly a race without honor, not even the Romulans would exterminate a helpless race they had defeat." _**Korras interjected.

It was not untrue what Korras had said but Lefcourt resented that this alien had called Humans of a helpless race that had been defeated, than he asked. "Who are these Romulans?"

**_"Like these Minbari they are also a race without honor, if possible they prefer not to face its enemies in a fair combat, they will stab you in your back if you give them the chance."_** Answered Korras.

Lefcourt thought that if he survived this War with the Minbari and some day, come to meet with these Romulans then the last thing he would do would be to turn his back to them, then he said.

"I do not have time to continue this conversation with you, I have a planetary defense to organize, and I will contact my government and will see if they are willing to meet with you."

Then Lefcourt proceed to contact President Levy to inform her about this new development.

Minutes later President Levy informed General Lefcourt that she had decided to meet with the aliens in one hour and in turn he informed the Klingon Brigadier of the President decision to meet with him and the landing coordinates where the meeting was to occur.

An hour later at the spaceport an entourage composed by President Levy, several senators and Military officers were waiting the arrival of the alien shuttle.

**On board the Kahless.**

"Lieutenant open communications with the B'moth." Korras commanded.

"Communications open Sir." K'nera responded.

"Captain Kreen you will be in the command of the fleet while I'm in the planet meeting with the leaders of these new humans, if the Minbari appear you are to assure the security of our fleet by all means necessary."

Then Korras pressed another button and activated the internal communications system.

"Commander Rodek come to the bridge, you will be in command of the Kahless under Captain Kreen while I and Comdr Shelby are away." Then Korras turned towards Shelby.

"You are coming with me Commander, as a Human your insight in analyzing their behavior could prove to be helpful."

"Yes Sir." She responded and then they headed to the transporter room.

Moments later before they stepped on the transporter pad a flash of light filled the room and "Q" appeared.

"I see you are going to meet more locals." "Q" said with its usual smile.

"I thought we had seen the last of you." Shelby said.

Then "Q" put its hand in the chest and pretended to be offended. "Cmdr you really know how to break a person's heart."

"You don't have a heart "Q"." She replied.

"Yes but if I had one it would be broken." "Q" said.

"What do you want this time?" asked an aggravated Korras.

"Q" continued with its offended posture. "If I didn't know you better I could swear that you two don't like me.

"Stop the act it doesn't became you, and yes we don't like you." Shelby said.

"As usual you lesser beings are ungrateful and show no appreciation despite everything I've done to help you, so off you go to the planet but I want to see results soon or the deal is over." Then "Q" snapped its fingers and disappeared then Korras and Shelby step in the transporter pad and faded away as columns of shimmering light to reappear a second later in front of the Earth Alliance entourage in the designated coordinates given by the Lefcourt to where the meeting was to occur.

Everyone was perplexed due to how the aliens had appeared in shimmering columns of light.

President Levy was the first one to advance towards the new arrivals, the human female in the gray uniform and the intimidating alien should be with whom General Lefcourt had spoken previously and if she remember correctly the apparently human female name was Cmdr Shelby of an alleged distant human Federation and the alien with ridged forehead and long black hair name was Brigadier Korras of previously unknown race that the aliens were saying it was called Klingon, then nervously Levy said

"Welcome to our planet, I'm President Levy, please excuse me for being this nervous but the way you arrived was much unexpected, how did you do it?"

"Greetings Madame President I'm Brigadier Korras from the Klingon Empire and this is Cmdr Shelby my current First Officer, about how we arrive … well we have technology that allows us to send matter across vast distances almost instantaneously." Korras answered trying not to go into many details.

"Very impressive technology indeed." Then Levy addressed to Shelby. "And welcome you too Cmdr, is it true that more Humans exists at many thousands light years away from here?"

"Yes Madame President is true that there are humans that far, it's a long story but a fascinating one." Then the Shelby began to talk about the ancient race known as Preservers and what the Federation knew about them and about the several Earths found so far created by the Preservers.

"Duplicated Earths!" Exclaimed Levy shocked.

"Yes I understand it's hard to imagine such a thing but I can assure you it is the truth." Shelby said.

In the group surrounding Korras and Shelby many voices were heard in the background showing astonishment in what they were hearing, but suddenly a loud voice was heard above all others.

"These are lies, she probably is not even human, this must be a trick like the Centauri have done to us before." said a senator called Morgan Clark.

"Are you accusing us of lying?" Korras asked to Clark in an angry tone.

Then Clark started shouting in a hysterical way. "THE ALIEN WANTS TO KILL ME, PLEASE SOMEBODY HELP ME … THIS ALIEN WANTS TO KILL ME."

Above Earth orbit a pair of starfuries were slowly approaching the IKS Kahless.

**On Board the Kahless.**

"Sir two human fighters are approaching us, what should I do?" Mollar the gunner of the Kahless asked to Commander Rodek.

"Are they targeting us?" Rodek asked.

"No Sir, only scanning us." The response was given to Rodek.

"Then we are going to maintain our status." Rodek responded.

**On Board the approaching starfuries.**

"What do you think of that ship Mitchell? It isn't very big but the power readings my computer is registering are almost off the scale." The squadron Leader Jeffrey Sinclair asked his wingman.

"My computer shows the same thing alpha leader, not even the big Minbari warships have readings this high, and it's almost unbelievable that a ship this small could produce that much power." Mitchell answered.

"I agree with you, what power source do you think they are using? This ship being this small cannot have much armor so in battle it shouldn't last long, not to mention that I can only see two frontal guns one in each wing, this certainly is not a war ship." said Sinclair

"I heard the rumor they also have a stealth system, before they stopped we could barely detect their silhouette, even the powerful tracking systems in Mars were having trouble detecting them, maybe they can teach us how to beat the Minbari stealth." Mitchell said.

"That would be like winning the jackpot and perhaps our last hope to stop the Minbari." Sinclair answered.

"I couldn't agree more with you." Mitchell responded.

**Meanwhile on board the Kahless.**

"Sir, sensors are detecting three contacts at the edge of the solar system." Toran at Ops said.

"Are they Minbari? Rodek asked.

"They are generating much interference but from what I can detect it matches the Minbari Commander." Toran answered.

Before Rodek could issue any order K'nera in communications informed him that the ship of Captain Kreen also had detected the unknown ships and ordered the fleet to go to yellow alert."

TBC 


	5. First impressions

**CHAPTER 5**

**Location: Geneva, Earth alliance. **

The attitude of Senator Morgan Clark left everyone present perplexed and not knowing what reaction to expect of the Klingon.

Stop screaming like a frightened female, you are so utterly pathetic that you are not worth that I waste my time with you, if I had attempted to kill you you wouldn't be alive right now." Said Korras in a loud tone.

"I'm a Senator from the Earth Alliance nobody talks to me in this way, GUARDS, GUARDS detain the alien."

"SENATOR CLARK," Shouted President Levy. " SHUT UP, you have not the authority to order the detention of anybody."

"But Madame President you can certainly see that they are lying, I am sure that we can make them confess their true intentions, for all we know they can be working with the Minbari and this is an elaborate attempt to catch us off guard, look how they appear so suddenly and with their ridiculous claims about others Earths, how can anyone believe blindly in them." Clark said.

"No one is blindly believing in them Senator, now calm yourself or I will have to ask you to leave." Replied Levy.

"But Madame President I..." Before Clark could finish the sentence Levy interrupt him.

"Enough Senator I'm not going to repeat myself again." Then she turned her attention to the new arrivals.

"I'm very sorry about this but you have to agree that from our point of view your claims are very hard to believe, what you told about that race called Preservers and they having created several Earths are very difficult to believe in?"

Then the Shelby came forward and spoke. "Yes Madame President I understand your point of view, unfortunately the Klingons databanks are not as detailed in this matter as Federation ones but they still have plenty information about my Earth Home-world.

Then Shelby showed to President Levy a small PADD with a small screen and soon in it images began to appear

First the images seen were landscapes, then the images turned to cities with buildings that little resemble the ones Levy is accustomed seeing and mainly because the buildings shown in the PADD have a very futurist appearance, it resembles too much with the buildings seen in old Sci-Fi movies that she remembers seeing in her childhood, also many thousands of persons were seen walking in wide streets but curiously land vehicles were not seen anywhere.

To Levy it seemed the perfect paradise, almost too perfect to be real.

Then the images showed the orbit of the planet the aliens were claiming to be a duplicate of Earth and hundreds of small space vehicles were seen traveling in all conceivable directions around dozens of space stations and strange spaceships surrounded by structures that resemble vaguely jump gates.

"These images are very impressive but you have to forgive of us if we will need more proof than what you shown us, how about that technology you describe as instantaneous transportation over vast distances? We are willing to buy it if proven that works, it would be a good way of establishing relations of the confidence between us." Said High-ranking Military Officer.

"Up to now you have done nothing more than to doubt everything that we said and even so you expect that we share with you such advanced technologies? Trust has to work in both directions so you must have your priorities solved." Said Korras still irritated for having doubted him.

"Please do not be offended, You must understand that we need time to digest all you have said and time is something we cannot afford right now, we are fighting for our salvation and we need new technologies to help us to turn the tides of the war, we are prepared to pay you a very generous amount of credits for this transportation technology you have." Vice President Santiago said.

We value honor and trust above everything else so your credits are nothing to us, not mentioning that even if we give you the schematic of such a technology you would not know where to begin, your technology is too primitive." Korras answered.

Meanwhile Captain Keen ordered the IKS Qo'nos of Captain Marlok to go investigate under cloak the detected ships and confirm for certain if were Minbari.

On surface of the planet Korras Communicator emitted a small sound.

"Korras here, what is it."

Captain Keen voice was heard. **_"We detected three contacts at the edge of the solar system, they are generating much interference and we are not certain that they are Minbari vessels so I ordered Captain Marlok to proceed under cloak and investigate."_**

"Understood Captain I will issue further orders soon, Korras out."

Meanwhile coming from a nearby building a man in a Military uniform was running towards President Levy and seconds later the man had reached the President and handed her a communicator and from it was heard the voice of General Lefcourt informing that the listening station in Pluto had detected unidentified contacts and that shortly afterwards all contacts with that station were lost so the probability of that contacts to be Minbari ships were high.

President Levy and all presents became very agitated with the received news then Levy turned to Korras.

"Those contacts aren't by any chance more ships of yours are they?"

"No Madame President they aren't, they must be the same contacts that Captain Kreen just informed me that he also detected." Replied Korras.

"I was afraid of that, It seems the Minbari are finally coming, Isn't anything you can do to help us? You seem to be a very advance race, if those contacts are really Minbari we don't have any chance to stop them, if you don't help us by the end of the day all life on this planet would be destroyed." Said Levy almost begging.

"I'll see what I can do but first I want him to apologize to me." Said Korras pointing to Clark.

"NEVER." Shouted Clark. "Don't you see what you are doing Madame President? You are handing our last hope of salvation to an alien we don't know anything about besides those ridiculous stories they told us."

"Senator you will apologize immediately or I will make sure you will aboard the first ship that is sent to face the Minbari." Said a irritated Levy

"You cannot do that, you don't have the authority." Replied an exasperated Clark and he start walking away.

"STOP HIM." Commanded President Levy and immediately two nearby guards grabbed Clark that starts struggling to get himself free.

"If you don't apologize to the Brigadier you can be certain I will carry out what I said."

A very reluctant and furious Senator Clark then apologized to Korras but clearly not in a very felt manner.

"Is that enough Brigadier?" It asked a hopeful president hoping that the answer was an affirmative one.

"For now it is." Korras said and then he continued. "I'm not familiar with Minbari tactics and way of thinking it would be helpful if you could provide me with the assistance of skillfully warrior of yours."

"What do you think General?" Levy asked to a General near her.

"Well maybe Commander Sheridan, he is one of the best we have in showing results against the Minbari." Replied the General.

"Lieutenant inform General Lefcourt immediately, Cmdr Sheridan is to take the first shuttle and to come here immediately." Said Levy to the man that had brought the communicator to her minutes earlier.

"That is not necessary just inform our ship of his exact location and we will take care of the rest." Stated Korras

"Cmdr Rodek, beam us up." Said Korras and a second later he and Shelby turned into shimmering columns of light and disappeared.

"You are a traitor, you're selling us to aliens but you are going to pay for this I will make certain of that." Spouted an enrage Senator Clark.

Meanwhile Brigadier Korras and Commander Shelby had just materialized on the pad of transporter room of the Kahless.

"Commander Shelby, stay here to greet their Commander I'm going to the Bridge."

"Yes Brigadier." Shelby replied.

Minutes later a figure starts materializing on board the Kahless.

**Meanwhile many light years away.**

"Captain's log stardate 52083.1 three days went by since we cross the passage created by 'Q' that leads to the Delta Quadrant, for the time being in spite of our best efforts we still haven't manage to find any trace of the Brigadier Korras fleet."

Suddenly behind Picard a familiar voice was heard. "Well well look who is here? I do not remember inviting you to the party? " Said "Q".

""Q" I was questioning myself when I would have the displeasure of your visit after all it was you who began this mess." Answered a very angry Picard.

"Whoa Jean-Luc calm yourself you will have a fit and we don't want that to happen do we? But changing the subject what are you doing here? As I said before I did not invite you so you better go back. "

"Not a chance "Q", as usual to avoid boredom you come with these games to amuse yourself and to hell with the consequences isn't?"

"Games? Are you insinuating that my actions are part of a game? You wouldn't recognize a game even if it bit you in the ass Picard. "

"Really? Then what was it? Which justification do you have for all this?"

"Do you really expect that I give you a justification? Me a 'Q' justify myself to you? Don't be ridiculous Jean-Luc, now turn around and go to your pathetic life before I do it for you."

"A Federation officer is in the middle of this mess and I intend to do everything in my power so that she returns safe and sound, besides the Q Continuum prohibited you of interfering with us so you cannot send us back."

"As usual you are wrong, all I would have to do was whish and you would be sent back, since our last meeting I thought you had become more humbler but I can see that I was wrong and you are as arrogant as ever, so as part of your continuous learning process I'm going to give you a mission of your own.

"The Klingons must continue their mission alone and for you I just put in your personal computer the coordinates to where you must go so it is better that you leave immediately because I am tired of seeing you flying around as a Klingon Da'nal." Then 'Q' disappeared but a second later his voice was heard and it seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at the same time

"_**And remember Picard this cannot be mention to the Klingons or I will be very unhappy and you don't want to see me unhappy."**_

Picard then went to his computer and after opening it he saw displayed in the screen the coordinates "Q" had spoken, then for curiosity Picard decided to ask a question to the computer.

"Computer do a search on the Kingon word Da'nal and tell me its meaning?" Asked Picard and seconds later the computer answered.

_Da'nal is a large colorful bird native from the planet Qo'nos and is known by his erratic flight and unpredictable behavior, in several regions of the Klingon Empire this animal is also known by the name of Da'vI' and … " _"Its enough no more details are necessary." Said Picard interrupting the description, then Picard closed the computer and exit his quarters going to the Enterprise Bridge.

"Mr. Data hail the Tel'Peh I need to talk to General Tanas."

"Yes Captain, hailing the Tel'Peh now." Said Data.

Seconds later the image of stars and hundreds of Klingon ships displayed in the main screen was replaced by the image of a not very happy General Tanas.

"I regret to inform you General it but due to unforeseen events we cannot accompany you any longer."

The Riker then gave a surprised glance to Captain Picard not knowing which unforeseen events might force them to leave the Klingons, but on the other side of the screen it was possible to see the mood of Tanas improving after receiving that information.

"Very unfortunate indeed Captain Picard but I am sure what the Klingon Empire can survive without your help." Then without ceremonies the Klingon General cut the transmission.

"Friendly guy isn't he?" Said Riker.

"Yes Number One very friendly, I almost saw the tears dropping from his face from sadness due to our departure." responded Picard sarcastically. "

"What really happened Sir? Which unforeseen events are forcing us to leave?"

"'Q' happened Number One, I received his visit moments ago and he said that unless we leave the Klingons he would send us back either if we want or not."

"But didn't the Q continuum forbid him of interfering with us?" Counselor Troy asked.

"According to him that is not applied any more and I decided not to take the risk and see if he was bluffing." Picard answered.

"Considering his past with us can we believe in him?"

""Q" is many things Number One but he is not known to being a liar so I believe in him."

"So what will we do now Captain? Are we going to return?

"No, 'Q' said that on the behalf of my **continuous learning process** we are going to have our own mission." Said Picard accenting the words "continuous learning process" After straightening his uniform.

"And which mission is this captain?" It asked an intrigued Deanna Troy.

"Your guess is as good as mine Counselor "Q" only supplied me some coordinates." Said Picard that then inserted those coordinates in a command panel in the armrest of his chair."

"Ensign Balkan let's head to the coordinates I've supplied and engage warp 9." Picard Said to helmsman doing his traditional hand gesture.

The Enterprise then changed its heading and in seconds it had left the Klingon fleet behind disappearing in the depths of the space.

**Location: Around the Narn Home world.**

A small blue shuttle was descending towards the planet, and as its occupants had done previously they were heading to a meeting with natives of the planet and saying that the natives were anxious to know the nature of this meeting was an understatement.

Minutes later the shuttle landed and from it three hooded figures exit from the vehicle and went towards several Narns waiting them that then escorted the threesome to a nearby building.

The main room of that building was very large and circular with many rows of Narns seated all around in ascending order.

The Narns that had escorted the hooded figures exit the room leaving the Minbari alone in the middle of the circular room.

Then a Narn stood up and spoke. "Welcome to the Kha'Ri, my name is G'Kar may I enquire why are the Minbari honoring us with their presence.

Then one of the threesome spoke. "We are here due to a matter of extreme importance to all races, a thousand years ago we fought against the forces of darkness and manage to defeat them, since then we have been the bearers of the light but several days ago our deep fears became reality when servants of the Shadows once again immerge, we lost many ships and warriors in order to stop their attack, now it is time of all races to join forces and with our leadership we will destroy the Shadows and its allies again as it was done in the past. "

"When did this happen?" Asked another Narn.

"It was six days ago, a disguised Shadow came and launched upon us his dark servants, now you must chose if you are with the forces of light or the forces of darkness.

"This is all very sudden we must know more of what is happening." said another Narn.

Then another Minbari replied. "We had been very patient with you Narns, we know that you sold weapons to the humans but we decide not to do anything because that was of no consequence, but the forces of darkness will not wait and if the forces of light are not quickly assembled we may not be able to stop the dark forces this time, you have up to our departure of the orbit to state your intentions and who is not with the forces of light is with the forces of darkness and must be destroyed."

Then the three Minbari exit the room and went towards their shuttle leaving the very astonished Narns behind in a very hot discussion as to what to do.

Sometime later just before the Minbari ship left orbit a Minbari entered in the Grey Council room bowed respectfully and said. "Venerable Council Members we receive a message from the Narn ruling body, they have agreed in joining us against the dark forces." Then he bowed again and left.

"The forces of light are growing soon we will be strong enough and the Shadows will be defeated once again." Said one of the nine to the others.

**Location: Remote Minbari Colony.**

Since the integration of this solar system in the great Minbari Federation that this remote place had been uneventful, not even a thousand years ago when the great war against the shadows happened that this place was in danger of an attack, so it wouldn't be now that this would happen, so not a very strong force of warships was present here, only two dozens of Sharlins at best plus several gun ships and an according number of fighters.

Suddenly without warning from several million kilometers away a strange an unidentified vessel was detected and a single Sharlin was dispatched to intercept the trespassers and punish them for their audacity.

On Bridge of the Minbari warship Alyt Santory of the warrior cast and belonging to the clan of the Moon shields was happy this incident had happened because since his assignment at this forgotten place he felt that he had been demoted and was resentful with his superiors, although he was more than convinced this interception was going to be a brief task he was glad because it would provide a brief distraction that he badly needed.

"What readings do we have from the intruders so far?" Asked the Alyt to the Minbari in charge of sensor array.

"The sensors must be malfunction because the readings don't make any sense." The Minbari replied.

"Why haven't you detected this problem before? I don't tolerate incompetents in my ship." Responded the Alyt, for years he waited to have a chance to show his competence in war and demonstrate that he deserved more than be relegated to this remote place, but now that something had happened his ship was malfunctioned and that was inadmissible.

"Its not my fault Alyt, the diagnostic system does not show any problems but the data doesn't make any sense, because they show the intruder slowing down from many times the speed of the light to a quarter the speed of light in mere seconds and that is impossible not to mention that any being on board would suffer many thousands of G forces and no living creature can survive that, not even our advanced dampening systems could compensate that deceleration."

"Show me its image." Commanded the Alyt.

Immediately in the middle of the bridge a holographic image appeared and it shows a ship with the shape of a cube.

"In name of Valen what is that? Which race in its right mind would build such thing?" The Alyt asked to nobody in particular. "How much time to intercept it?" Santory asked.

"Twenty seconds Alyt." It answered the Minbari operating the sensors.

"Open the gun ports and hail them." Santory commanded.

The Order was carried out immediately but no answer was given and seconds later as if the mighty Sharlin did not exist, the cube simply ignored them and continued towards the planet.

"Nobody ignores a Minbari, target them and fire at will." Shouted the Alyt.

Immediately the Minbari ship unleashed its mighty weapons against the cube but almost no visible damage was seen to happen, immediately the cube stopped and emitted a green beam towards the Sharlin that exploded spectacularly, then the cube continue its course towards the planet as if nothing had happened.

TBC


	6. Errand of mercy

**CHAPTER 6**

To say that Sheridan was overwhelmed by the last events was putting things mildly, as almost everyone in Earth Force he had heard the news about the recent arrival of unknown aliens and about their meeting with President Levy, but what he could never imagine even in his wildest dreams was what was about to happen to him next.

A few minutes ago a High-Ranking Earth Force Officer come and told him that those new aliens were considering the Earth Force request for providing help in the war, but since apparently the aliens did not know much about the Minbari they asked the presence of someone who had experience in dealing with them and Sheridan's name was mentioned.

Sheridan obviously said he would help in what he could and asked to where he should go to meet with the aliens but the answer was that he should remain where he was during the next couple of minutes.

He did not understand why he should wait when speed was of the essence due to the imminent Minbari attack, a minute later he began to feel a tingling sensation in his entire body and everything around him began to fade away as if he was going to faint, but then a instant later his vision began to clear up again and he found himself in a very different room.

Standing in front of him was what apparently seem to be a human female in a strange uniform, it was black all over except the shoulders where it was gray and also had a strange insignia in her chest.

"Welcome on board the Kahless, I am Cmdr Elizabeth Shelby and at present I serve as First Officer in this ship."

"A pleasure to meet you, I'm Cmdr John Sheridan but now do you mind tell me how in hell I appear here and where here is? Moments ago I was in Earth Force headquarters and now I'm not there any more." said a confused Sheridan looking around attempting to get his bearings straight.

"Didn't your superiors inform you that you were coming aboard our ship?" Shelby asked.

"Well … yes I was informed about that but they obviously forgot mentioning which transport method was going to be used, they just told me to wait, how did I arrived here anyway?"

"You were beamed but don't worry it's a common and quite safe proceeding." Shelby answered.

"Beamed what is that?" Now an even more confused Sheridan asked.

"Your whole body was disassembled at a quantum level transported through an energy beam and assembled again on the destination point." Shelby answered.

"WHAT? What do you mean by disassembled? " Asked an astonished Sheridan.

"Do not worry, as I said before this is a safe proceeding and there was no time to transport you in a conventional manner, presently we are heading to meet with what we believe to be three Minbari ships detected at the edge of your solar system, if they turn out to be the Minbari hopefully we will be able to call them to reason and avoid more deaths."

Meanwhile a not very convinced Sheridan began to check his entire body to make sure that no parts were missing in spite of Shelby assurances.

"Please follow-me Cmdr." Shelby said.

Then Shelby exited the room and entered in a corridor followed closely by Sheridan who was still looking around.

"So are we aboard the alien ship that arrived recently?" Sheridan asked and also noticing the gravity.

"Yes we are." Shelby answered.

"You said you are the First Officer of this ship but you look human, how can that be unless you only look human like the Centauri?

"To make a long history short I can tell you that I am as human as you and a Cmdr of the United Federation of Planets temporarily assigned to this ship."

"That is quite short isn't?" Sheridan asked while giving a glimpse over his shoulder after noticing two aliens walking in a cross corridor.

"Are those guys over there to whom this ship belongs to?" Sheridan asked pointing to the two Klingons.

"That's correct Cmdr." Shelby replied.

"Can't you at least tell me from where do you and they come from and why did you decided to help us when no other race did?"

"Later all your questions will be answered Cmdr, now is time of more urgent matters." Shelby answered to Sheridan while the door of bridge opened to let them in.

To Sheridan was as entering in another planet, the appearance of the alien bridge seemed more advanced than anything that he had seen before, but the most unsettling thing was all the aliens looking straight at him as he entered in the bridge.

Then Shelby addressed to Korras seated in the command chair at the center of the bridge

"Here is Cmdr John Sheridan from the Earth Alliance as requested by you Sir." Shelby said.

"Good... please approach commander nobody is going to bite you." Korras said to Sheridan seeing that he was very tense, and began to laugh followed by all other Klingons in the bridge.

Then seeing that they were laughing at him Sheridan made a forced smile and come forward.

"It seems that your superiors think highly of you but I am not easily impressed as Cmdr Shelby can testify, so tell me Commander in your opinion how do you think that those Minbari would react to us showing up?" Korras asked to Sheridan.

"Well Sir they have a of very enormous superiority complex and this makes them not very receptive to establishing relations with other races that they see as inferiors so in my experience unless the race that is establishing contact with them shows a submissive behavior they probably will become hostiles." Sheridan Responded.

"And what are their tactics when engaged in battle?" Korras asked.

"Well Sir about that there is not much I can say to you, they are so advanced in comparison with everyone else that they normally don't use much strategy, they only keep on coming and steamroll their opponents with sheer force, the few strategies I saw them use is jump point attacks."

"How does those jumps point attacks work?" Korras asked.

Sheridan was surprised with the question, how was possible a space faring race not know what an jump point attack is, then he noticed a window situated in the front of the bridge and was not showing them traveling in the hyperspace but in normal space and if those streaks he seeing passing at high speeds were stars they had to be traveling at millions of times the speed of the light and according to known laws of physics that was impossible.

"Sorry to ask you Sir but don't you know what a jump point attack is?" A very surprised Sheridan asked.

"No, the data we acquired from Brakiri don't have that proceeding described so please explain how it works Cmdr." Korras said.

"A jump point attack is opening a jump point on the location of the selected target and that is guaranteed to destroy it, even entire fleets can be destroyed using this tactic, the reason why Earth Force or other races generally never use this type of attack is because our sensors are not accurate enough to lock on the target from hyperspace or to get close enough in normal space to use it." Sheridan described.

"Interesting, and what is the maximum distance in which this tactic can be used in normal space and how powerful is the energy released by the opening of a jump point?" Korras asked.

"The maximum distance a jump point can be generated from a ship as far as I know is about ten kilometers, about how much energy a jump point opening releases I don't think an attempt to make a calculation was ever made but in opinion it goes in the hundreds of megatons."

"That is indeed a formidable weapon that must be avoid, and what more weapons do the Minbari have? The Brakiri data are also very scarce in that department." Korras asked.

"Minbari ships have gravitic neutron cannons or slicer beams as we call it for its primary batteries, those weapons true effect is to cut deep within the vital components of the ships they are fighting.

Their secondary batteries consist of fusion beam cannons that are as powerful as the main batteries of other races. When both the main battery and the secondary battery are used nothing can survive for very long.

For last they have Neutron beam mounts for point defense and capable of destroying fighters in one-hit and fusion guns that are used for both anti fighter defense and against larger targets when not engaging fighters or other small ships.

Our Intel also told us their ships also carry missile launchers but so far we never saw it being used.

"Lieutenant K'nera send this information to other ships." Korras ordered to the Communications officer to which she acknowledged.

"Sorry to ask Sir but did you said other ships? I thought that you had only this ship? How many more ships do you have? " A surprised Sheridan asked.

"All in due time Cmdr and now is not the proper one." Korras answered and obviously Sheridan did not pursue with the interrogation.

"Sir, Captain Marlok is confirming that those ships are definitely Minbari and asks for additional orders." K'nera informed.

"Tell him to keep on following them, we will be there soon." Korras answered.

Sheridan then addressed Shelby that now was near to him. "Cmdr excuse my ignorance but those things shown in that window are not stars are they?"

"No Cmdr what we're seeing are free particles in space interacting with the boundaries of our warp field." Shelby replied.

"Warp what?" Sheridan asked.

"Warp field, is what allow us to travel between stars Cmdr, it stretches space in a wave, causing the space in front of a ship to contract along the axis the spacecraft wishes to travel in and the space behind it to expand, the ship rides this wave inside a region known as a warp bubble and since the ship is not actually moving within this bubble but rather being carried along as the region itself moves conventional relativistic effects do not apply." Shelby replied.

"Such method of travel is revolutionary how long did you discover it and how fast it goes?" An amazed Sheridan asked.

"From where we come from many races have discovered warp travel independently, for example the Klingons have it at more than a thousand years but on my planet it was discovered by Zefram Cochrane at only three hundred years ago, the speed at a which a ship can travel depends of the density of the area of space at where you are, we can go as fast as several hundreds thousand times the speed of light in very high density areas but that is only possible in very few places, generally the speeds at we can travel are much slower only around several thousand times the speed of light."

Sheridan's jaw almost hit the floor with the information that Shelby provided, if what she said was true the Klingons were much more advanced than even the Minbari and now he began to question himself how powerful the Klingon would be in the weapons department, and what would happen if the Klingons could successfully help Earth against the Minbari to later shown to be hostiles and turn against Earth, after all until now they only knew what the Klingons had told them.

"Sir Two minutes to intercept the Minbari." Toran at Ops said.

About the speed Shelby obviously was not exaggerating, they had left Earth in less than half-an-hour and they were already at the edge of the solar system while traveling in normal space, Sheridan thought to himself.

"Raise shields and prepare to leave warp at hundred and fifty thousand Kellicams from the Minbari." Korras ordered to Kajz in the helm to which he acknowledged immediately.

About a minute later Kajz informed that they were dropping from warp to impulse and Korras ordered yellow alert and to change to tactical mode, then Sheridan saw what he thought to be a window in the bridge was in fact a very advanced viewscreen displaying a virtual representation of three Minbari ships with all sort of details, weapons, speed, hull composition and only showing very briefs and occasional interferences, Sheridan was certain that anyone in Earth Force would be capable of sell his soul to the Devil to have this technology if give them that chance.

"What is a Killicam?" Sheridan asked to Shelby.

"It's approximately two kilometers." She answered

Again Sheridan was amazed that they could scan the Minbari in detail from at least three hundred thousand kilometers away when Earth Force was not able to do that even at point blank.

"Drop to one quarter impulse and hail them." Korras commanded.

**On board the lead Minbari ship.**

"Alyt the sensors just detected an unknown ship coming in our direction in an astonishing speed and they are hailing us." A Minbari said.

"Let me see it." The Minbari Captain ordered.

Moments later a holographic display was activated and all the Minbari in the Bridge could see the strange ship, it was very small and could hardly be a challenge to any Minbari warship but its design and the speed at that was traveling was an indication that was a somewhat advanced ship.

"Does our databanks have on record anything about whom that ship could belong to?" The Minbari Captain asked.

"No Alyt, nothing." Was the reply.

"What else can our sensor say about them?" the Alyt asked.

"Very little Alyt, I am detecting some sort of energy barrier surrounding that ship that is preventing us from having more accurate readings on them."

"Open our gun ports as a sign of respect and hail them." The Minbari Captain ordered.

**On board the Klingon Ship.**

"Brigadier they are activating their weapons." Toran spouted.

"What? Power all weapons and prepare to fire on my command." An angry Korras replied.

**Location: Near the Centauri boarder.**

"Sir I'm detecting massive surges of energy two light years away from us and also an increase number of contacts appearing from nowhere at each second." A surprised Operations officer said from the IKS Tel'Peh to General Tanas.

"Show me tactical." Tanas ordered.

Immediately in the Main viewscreen it appeared the representation of hundreds of unknown contacts appearing from nowhere and its numbers were increasing continuously.

"Can't we have a clearer signal?" Tanas asked harshly.

"The energy surges are causing too much interference but I believe that those contacts are ships." The Operations Officer replied.

"Plot an intercept course towards them immediately, they are the first sign of life we detected since we arrive in this cursed Quadrant, they may give us the information we need. Tanas said.

"General if those contacts are in fact ships then that is a very large fleet and we know nothing about them, we should proceed carefully." Worf Said to Tanas.

"Your life in the Federation had made you weak Ambassador, you should try to recapture the Klingon spirit you seem to have lost, a true Klingon fear nothing and in case you have missed we also have a large fleet, who ever his out there should be the ones to be concerned." Tanas replied to Worf.

"General don't mistake me being careful with being weak, our mission is too important to the Klingon Empire to risk it with unnecessarily actions." An angry Worf replied.

"You are not the one in command here Ambassador I am and don't you forget about it … set course immediately as I ordered." Tanas shouted to the Klingon at the helm.

Moments later the Klingon fleet changed course and started heading towards the new detected ships.

**Location: Remote Minbari Colony.**

The destruction of the Minbari ship did not pass unnoticed and almost immediately all the remaining ships that were protecting the colony converged towards the unknown ship, dozens of Nial fighters began exiting from their mother ships and accelerating towards the incoming enemy with thirst of vengeance.

The Cube continue its course undisturbed as if nothing had happened or as if nothing was about to happen but seconds later a swarm of Minbari fighters start unleashing their weapons but to the pilots astonishment the hundreds of beams fired did little or none damage at all, the cube response however wasn't as undamaged as the response from the fighters had been and dozens of fighters start ceasing to exist each second when hit by a correspondent number of beams emitted from the cube.

In a very short time the initial large swarm of fighters was reduced to less than half a dozen.

Meanwhile the big Minbari warships reached weapons range and began firing its much powerful weapons, the difference between the fighters' attack and the attack of big warships was obvious as seen by the large explosions that began erupting from the cube hull but unfortunately the damage was not the enough to slow it down, seconds later it was the big warships turn to began to feel the devastating effects of the cube weapons.

On the surface of the planet inside a tall building several Minbari were witnessing the continuous battle through a holographic display and were horrified with what was happening, Minbari ships were seen to explode or being reaped apart everywhere with an unimaginable easiness it was as if the mightier warships the Minbari ever produce were absolutely insignificant before such a enemy.

Minutes later the battle was over and only debris was seen in the battlefield, as the cube reached the planet a communication was heard from it, it seemed a million voices speaking simultaneously but at the same time was as if was a single voice, a dark metallic voice.

_**"We are the Borg. You will be assimilated and your culture will adapt to service us. Resistance is futile."**_

Apparently that message had been transmitted to the entire planet and soon in the streets thousands of Minbari were seen running in panic trying to enter in the first available shuttles or flyers they could find to escape from this new enemy, then in the middle of all those running Minbari columns of shimmering light start appearing from thin air and began to coalesce into humanoid creatures with paled skin and wearing metallic prosthesis that cover many areas in their bodies, in the beginning they were dozens then hundreds and finally many thousands that began to attack any Minbari in their reach.

TBC


	7. Déjà vu

**CHAPTER 7**

**On board the Kahless.**

"I'm to sorry interrupt you Sir but the Minbari also open their gun ports to greet and not necessarily to fire, it was because of this we fired on them first and the war began." Sheridan said to Korras.

Korras thought for a couple seconds what Sheridan said and then replied. "That is the must idiotic procedure anyone can use when trying to initiate a first contact and can only bring trouble … lay in a course as far as possible from their weapons and open communications." Korras ordered to Kajz and K'nera respectively.

**On board the Minbari Ship.**

"Alyt the small alien ship also opened its gun ports and is answering to our hails but they just executed a very aggressive evasive maneuver that places them in a favorable tactical position." A Minbari officer said.

"Correct our position immediately and open communications." Alyt Shakat ordered.

Without delay the Minbari war cruiser began moving trying to neutralize the Klingon's ship favorable position but the Negh'Var countered that movement effortlessly and the relative positions remained, at the same moment the holographic display started showing the image of an unknown alien speaking in a confidant manner.

"**_I'm Brigadier Korras of the House of Malok of the Klingon Empire, I'm want to speak with who is in command."_**

The Minbari response was swift. "I'm Alyt Shakat fleet commander of the Minbari Federation, I have never seen your race before so state from where you came and your intentions quickly." The Minbari Captain demanded.

"**_We came from far away and arrived here only recently but since then we had contact with several local races including the local humans and we have came to know about your conflict with them, therefore we decided to contact you to resolve the situation." _**Korras said but began to be irritated with the attitude of Shakat.

"WHAT? Your race must be very foolish for wanting to interfere in our affairs, we are the oldest and wiser of the young races so the rectitude of our actions regarding the cowardly humans that murder our beloved leader Dukhat are beyond dispute, fortunately for you I'm in an important mission and have no time to waste with fools so I will allow you to return to your brethren, but be warned that in the future no more contemplations will be given." Shakat spouted.

"**_It is you who is foolish for talking to us in such a disrespecting manner, it is not wise to have us as enemies therefore leave immediately and warn your kind to cease all attacks on the humans, this is your first and last warning." _**Korras threatened.

Shakat couldn't believe in the audacity of the alien. "You must be insane or have a death wish; I will make an example of you so that nobody in the future dares defy us again." Morann said enraged and before the transmission was cut he saw the alien doing a movement with his hand to someone out of the holographic image

"Alyt three unknown ships just appeared behind us." A surprised Minbari shouted to his captain.

"WHAT? How was that possible? Why didn't we detect their arrival sooner? Shakat asked.

"Unknown Alyt, the sensors were not detecting anything a second ago then they simply appeared from nowhere, I can't explain how that was possible but they are similar to the other vessel only smaller so they must be from the same race." The Minbari in charge of the sensors answered.

"Even smaller? Then this should end quickly despite their double-crossing, fire at will." Shakat commanded.

Without delay the Sharlin proceed to fire its weapons on the Negh'Var but while a Bluish flare stopped the Minbari beams from impacting on the Klingon ship there was nothing to stop a photon torpedo from impacting on the Minbari war cruiser.

Inside the Kahless the only effect felt by the Minbari attack was a strong shudder and Sheridan who was in the middle of the Bridge and not used to experiencing gravity in a middle of a space battle lost his balance and fell on the floor. His immediate reaction was to look around to see how much damage the ship had suffered from the Minbari attack but to his amazement no apparent damage was seen, since some time ago he had wondered how powerful the Klingon weapons were so his question was quickly answered when he saw a fast yellow glowing orb appear from beneath the viewscreen and impacting on the Minbari ship with a tremendous explosive force.

The explosion was so massive that large pieces of polycrystalline hull were hurled into space and most of the front end of the Sharlin was completely destroyed together with its many weapons emplacements located there.

The two Tinashi War-frigates upon seeing what happened immediately fired as many weapons possible on the Kahless but unfortunately for them the Klingon ship was already maneuvering to avoid further fire and the beams that strike were deflected by the shields as before.

The same thing could not be said for the Minbari ships that despite had also begun doing evasive maneuvers were comparatively much slower and consequently the Klingon ships hadn't any difficulty in hitting them with a rain of disrupter fire resulting in devastating effects.

Under such a violent attack one Tinashi was hit in the engine section and immediately began to lose power and drifting, the other Tinashi despite of the extensive damage that received in the attack was not hit in such a critical area and remained operationally and returning fire with as many weapons it could managing to hit the light cruiser Pak't Marr and the attack cruiser Qo'nos but as their shields held firmly no damages were done, meantime the attack cruiser B'moth effectuated a quick 90 degrees turn aligned its prow with the Tinashi and launched an volley of torpedoes that sealed the fate of the already heavily damaged War-Frigate, in seconds the Tinashi was turned into an expanded ball of fire that throw debris in all the directions.

The Sharlin even with its front heavily destroyed it was much more resistant than its smaller companions so continue fully functional and firing all its remaining weapons at the maximum rate possible at the Klingon ships that were moving in all directions trying to steer clear of the intense fire thrown at them, and although many beams were evaded it was impossible to escape all.

**On the Sharlin's Bridge.**

"Alyt the energy barrier detected earlier in the first ship is present in all their ships and reducing drastically the efficiency of our weapons, however our stealth and polycrystalline hull does not seem to have any effect in their targeting systems and weapons, the Trilana is disabled and the Shan'la had just been completely destroyed." A Minbari said

"We will fight to the death if necessary; now concentrate all weapons on their main ship, after its destruction the others will lose the spirit to keep on fighting." Shakat said.

"Yes Alyt, immediately." The Minbari acknowledged.

Now the Kahless and the Pak't Marr had join forces and were flying side-by-side in an exchange of fire with the Minbari war cruiser and Sheridan was appalled by how well the Klingons were faring against the Minbari and how was possible a ship only shaking from so heavy fire, fire that certainly would have destroyed any Earth Alliance ship in seconds.

The IKS Pak't Marr however was just a light cruiser and compared with its larger companions was incapable to deal with the same punishment so a direct hit from the main weapons of the Sharlin brought its shields down and damaged it forcing it to cease the attack and steer away but The Negh'Var despite also having being hit repeatedly maintained its course without suffering much damages.

"Sir the Pak't Marr just lost shields and took heavy damage so is leaving the formation but our shields are holding at sixty percent." Toran informed.

"Good, fire main disruptors at will." Korras commanded.

"Firing now Sir." Mollar said with a smile.

The Minbari war cruiser although having fought courageously was not able to resist the Kahless last attack so it began drifting in space while many secondary explosions were erupting from its hull.

The attack cruisers B'Moth and Qo'nos meanwhile closed on remaining drifting Tinashi from both sides for the kill but as seeing the ship completely helpless and not existing honor in slaying a defeated adversary Captain Kreen decided that it should be a good capture and decided to spare it so both Klingon ships flew by it without fire and turned away to see if it was necessary any help against the larger Minbari ship

Inside the Sharlin chaos was everywhere with internal explosions happening and beams falling from the ceiling hitting many unfortunate Minbari.

Alyt Shakat had a deep wound in his head but was continuing to issue orders.

"Alyt we lost all propulsion, main power and all our weapons are inactive." A Minbari said.

"Alyt the enemy is asking for our surrender." Another Minbari said.

"NEVER, a Minbari warrior never surrenders, prepare to self-destruct the ship." Shakat Commanded.

**On board the Kahless.**

"Sir they are not responding to our calls for surrender." K'nera said.

"What is their status?" Korras asked.

Toran at ops responded. "Life support is failing, structural integrity is at twenty five percent but holding … wait I'm detecting an overload in the engines … the ship is going to blow up at any moment."

"Full reverse now." Korras Commanded

Moments later a massive explosion destroyed the Minbari war cruiser completely.

"Fleet Status?" Korras asked.

The B'Moth and the Qo'nos have no damages to report but the Pak't Marr however is reporting considerable damage to the hull, the loss of warp drive and several casualties."

"Inform Captain Marlok to assist the Pak't Marr and Captain Kreen to secure the area." Korras said to K'nera that immediately carried the order.

"Lieutenant Toran what is the condition of the drifting Minbari ship?" Korras asked.

"I'm detecting no power, life support or gravity but structural integrity is stable." Toran replied.

"Tell me Cmdr, would you like to board the ship of your enemies?" Korras asked to Sheridan.

"Sir, considering how damaged the ship is do you think its safe to go aboard right now?" Sheridan asked surprised with Korras question.

"Are you afraid?" Korras asked.

"Of course not Sir." Sheridan replied.

"Good, follow Cmdr Shelby, she will lead the boarding party, and Cmdr Shelby try to bring some prisoners to be questioned." Korras said.

"Yes Brigadier." Shelby Replied.

Then both Shelby and Sheridan exit the Bridge and gone to the armory room.

Minutes later after passing through several corridor and elevators they entered in a large room where many Klingons were wearing environmental suits and carrying as many handheld weapons as they could, some of those weapons were strange semicircular blades.

"Are all warriors ready Lieutenant Gorrod?" Shelby asked to a Klingon that was the most high-ranking officer of the group.

"Yes Cmdr, those aliens are going to pay with their lives for dare attacking us." Gorrod answered making a traditional Klingon posse of his arm over his chest.

"Go easy Lieutenant, Brigadier Korras wants prisoners for questioning, now if you and all warriors are geared up proceed to the transporter room, I will be there soon.

After Gorrod confirmed their readiness the entire Klingon group went out leaving Shelby and Sheridan alone.

"Let's put our suits on Cmdr, I will instruct you how to do it." Shelby Said.

Minutes later after both being all set Shelby reached a pair of small weapons and handed one to Sheridan.

"This is a Klingon disrupter Cmdr and it is set to stun so don't touch in any other buttons except the trigger." Shelby said.

"What would happen if I did?" Sheridan asked.

"In the best of situations you could vaporize a Minbari or open a large hole in a bulkhead, so let's try not to do that Cmdr." Shelby said smiling to Sheridan that smiled back.

Then they went to the transporter room to join the rest of the boarding party.

Later a dozen of Klingons and two humans in environmental suits, antigravity boots and heavily armed materialized aboard the Minbari frigate, since life support was down securing the Minbari ship prove to be an easy task, the few Minbari still alive were in no condition to offer resistance.

An hour later the victorious Klingon fleet was heading back to Earth with the Trilana in tow.

"Since the Minbari ship is heavily damaged we will have to tow it at slow impulse so our return to Earth will take some time, perhaps in the meantime you would like to have some of your questions answered?" Shelby said to Sheridan.

"I would appreciate that very much Cmdr." Sheridan replied.

"Then come with me that I will show you something you will find interesting." She said.

A minute later they entered in an empty room with black walls and yellow grids marked on them.

"What is this?" Sheridan asked.

"This entire room is a holographic simulator in which any conceivable environment can be simulated by using a combination of holographic images, force fields, tractor beams, sounds, smells, and even replicated matter if the need arises, I know you are not very familiarized with these technologies but believe me that with the right combination a virtual environment can be indistinguishable from a real one." Shelby said with an absolute certainty.

"Unbelievable, so it should be like being inside a three dimensional movie isn't?" Sheridan asked.

"Exactly, but a very realistic one, let me show you … Computer load simulation Shelby3A." Shelby said to the computer.

Even after all the explanations Shelby gave what happened next was beyond anything Sheridan could imagine, in a second the world around him changed into a complete new one, suddenly he found himself in the middle of a very well kept garden surrounded by futurist buildings but the most impressive thing was the details as wind passing, the smell of flowers, or even the warmth that the sun irradiated upon him.

"Are you certain that we are still in the holographic room and were not transported by one of those teleporting machines." Sheridan asked in totally awe.

"Absolutely certain Cmdr, We are still inside the room and what you are seeing is a representation of the Starfleet Academy campus in San Francisco on my Earth and at your right you can even see the Golden Gate Bridge." Shelby said smiling and pointing to it.

**USS Voyager: Capt. Janeway quarters.**

The lights were off and the only illumination seen in the room was the one entering through the transparent aluminium windows coming from distant stars, Janeway was sleeping deeply in her bed when the tranquillity suddenly was broken by a flash of light and "Q" appeared lie-in next to her in the bed.

Such sudden appearance startled Janeway making her jump out of the bed.

"Q" what the hell are you doing in here?" Janeway asked still recovering from the sudden appearance.

"Hello Katy, is that the proper way to greet an old friend?" "Q" asked with a smile.

"You cannot appear in that way in mid-night on the quarters of a person, I could be in less proper clothing." Janeway said.

"So? You shouldn't be ashamed in showing your body as it is more than appropriate to a bipedal species as yourself." "Q" stated

"Thanks but flattering isn't going to get you anywhere." She said sarcastically and then continued. "Now what is it that you want this time?"

"Do I really need a reason to visit an old friend?" "Q" asked with an innocent face.

"Yes you do, you never just show up to visit an old friend, what troubles you intend to bring us this time? Janeway asked again.

"Alright since you insist in going direct to business as you humans say, I'm here to make you a proposal you can't refuse." "Q" said.

"Of course I can just read my lips very carefully, I … am … not ... interested … in … any … proposal … that … you … have … for … me, now go away I really need to sleep I had a very tough day." Janeway said.

"I know how egger you are to hear my proposal so here it goes, … Instead of continuing in this present course and taking many decades to reach Earth, I'm offering you a new way that could allow you to be there much sooner, what do you say Katy?" "Q" asked.

"Really? Why? What is the catch? Janeway asked.

"Why do you think there is a catch? After all I'm known to be very generous." "Q" said.

"With you there is always a catch, and when was the last time that you were generous?" Janeway asked.

"I'm here with good intentions and what do I receive? Suspicions that's what I receive." "Q" replied pretended to be offended.

"Stop with the "I'm offend" posture, you never do anything without a second intention so what is that you really want?" Janeway asked.

"I can't tell you that, it would lose all the fun, it would be the same thing as reading the last page of a book first and knowing the end in advance." "Q" said.

"Then we have nothing more to talk about, now go away I'm tired and need to rest." An increasing frustrated Janeway said.

"I can read you like an open book my dear captain, under that tough façade you are overwhelmed of excitement from what I said." "Q" said.

"Oh yes I really couldn't be more excited" Janeway said sarcastically and yawning. "But tell me you were not supposed to be babysitting junior instead of being here annoying me?" Janeway asked.

"And who said I'm not?" "Q" replied with is superior look.

"Well I'm not seeing him anywhere." Janeway said looking around.

"Of course not and that's why you are a being with a very limited intelligence and senses that barely can understand four dimensions while I'm a member of the Q continuum capable of understanding all the mysteries of the universe and count dimensions as humans count sheep's when can't go to sleep." "Q" said making a dramatic pose.

"I'm detecting a headache coming this way so let's end this, what I have to do for you to go away?" A frustrated Janeway asked while rubbing her forehead.

"Now you really did hurt my feelings so I will go away but you will change your mind sooner than you think, bye." "Q" said disappearing in the usual flash of light leaving Janeway alone in the room but when she was going to the bed to resume her sleep she notice through the windows that Voyager had drop out of warp.

"**_Captain this is Harry, you should come to the bridge as soon as possible we have a situation." _**Was heard from the internal communication system.

"What is it Mr. Kim?" Janeway asked.

"_**A wormhole just appeared in front of us Captain."**_

"I'm on my way Mr. Kim; I'm on my way, Janeway out."

Minutes later Capt. Janeway entered in the Bridge joining the rest of the senior staff that was already there.

"So what do we know about this wormhole so far?" Janeway asked.

"All analysis we have done so far tell us that this wormhole doesn't behave like any other we have seen before, I've sent a probe to gather more data but as soon the probe entered the wormhole we lost all contact with it." Chakotay Said.

"I can't say I'm surprised commander, I believe that that wormhole may have been created by "Q"." Janeway said.

""Q" are you certain Captain? Chakotay asked surprised.

"Oh yes unfortunately I am Cmdr, Just a few minutes ago I received a visit from him in my quarters." Janeway replied.

"What did he wanted Captain?" Tuvok asked from his tactical console.

"The usual Mr. Tuvok, to get us into trouble as if we didn't have enough of that." Janeway replied and then continue. "He told me that we could continue in our present course and take decades to reach home or we could take a new route and get home much sooner."

"So are we going in Captain? Harry Kim asked imagining arriving on Earth very soon.

"It doesn't seem like the "Q" we know, Why being so bighearted so suddenly." Chakotay asked.

"I agree Cmdr, there is more then meets the eye and he is not saying what is." Janeway replied. "So basically we are screwed either way we choose isn't Captain?" Paris asked. "So it seems Mr. Paris, so it seems." Janeway said. 

TBC


	8. Deadly decisions

**On board the IKS Negh'Var: General Tanas's ship**.

"General at our current speed we will reach the alien fleet in one minute." The Ops officer said.

"Good… let's drop to full impulse and have half the fleet to cloak and implement an kappa-four tactical deployment." Tanas commanded.

The order was promptly executed and moments later one hundred and twenty five ships seemed to disappear in the emptiness of interstellar space.

**On board the Centauri command ship.**

"Admiral the sensors have just detected a small fleet approaching, they are coming faster than anything ever detected before." A Centauri said.

"How many ships does that fleet have? And who are they?" The Centauri Admiral asked.

"They are still too far for we to get a positive identification but that fleet is composed only by slightly more than one hundred ships and in their present speed they will reach us in five minutes." The Centauri said.

"Put the fleet on maximum alert." The Admiral Durano Marray commanded and afterwards he addressed his second in command and asked. "How long until the arrival of the Minbari?"

"At least a couple more hours Admiral." Captain Urza Lotoru answered.

"I don't like this situation one bit, first the Minbari came with some a far fetch history that some dark forces are coming, second they demanded that we help them fighting those same forces and then as if it wasn't enough they choose this remote place for us to join our fleets but then guess what? Instead of the Minbari is an unknown fleet to arrive first." The Centauri Admiral said to Captain Lotoru.

"I agree entirely with you Sir, the Emperor should never have agreed with we helping the Minbari against those unknown dark forces who ever they may be, after all we only have the Minbari word that they are dangerous." The Captain answered

"Unfortunately the Emperor and the Centarum did not have the courage to oppose the Minbari request." The Admiral said.

"Admiral we now have a good reading of the unknown ships, its configurations are different from any other previously encountered." A Centauri informed.

"Hail them." The Centauri Admiral commanded.

**On the Bridge of IKS Negh'Var.**

"General I'm detecting tachyon emissions coming from the alien ships, but they are highly modulated and too weak be any kind of weapon." The communications official said to Tanas.

"Are they trying to detect our cloak ships?" Tanas asked.

"If they are the emissions are being sent to the wrong place, solely our uncloaked ships are being bombarded with the tachyon beams." The Ops official said.

"Show me tactical." Ordered Tanas.

Then the main viewscreen start displaying all sort of information's on it.

"Is this information's accurate?" Tanas asked.

"I'm not detecting any malfunction on the sensors or any sort of jamming so the data should be accurate General." The Ops officer replied.

"That's strange, those vessels appear to be warships but there isn't any indications of they having warp cores, subspace sensors or even shield generators." Tanas said.

Then Worf close on the comm. officer and asked. "Could not those tachyon emissions be communication beams?"

"Communications using tachyons?" Asked an astonished Communications officer to Worf thinking that he should be nuts for suggesting such thing.

"Yes, some years ago the Enterprise discovered a primitive race that did not have subspace technology so instead they used modulated tachyon beams for fast than light communications." Worf answered.

Still full of doubts the Communications Officer began doing a more thorough analysis of the emissions and seconds later the Klingon come up to a conclusion.

"General, Ambassador Worf may be correct, this can be indeed a very primitive form of communications." The klingon said with an embarrassed voice and very irritated by not having detected that.

"Is it possible to reconfigure our communications array and listening those transmissions?" Tanas asked.

"If there is a way I can do it General." The Klingon said.

"Than proceed quickly and do not fail me again." Tanas replied harshly.

**On board the Centauri Command Ship. **

"Admiral so far they are not answering to our hails." Said the Centauri in charge of communications.

"Could it be that they are the dark forces that the Minbari mentioned?" Captain Lotoru asked

"If they are than this can only be can be an small exploration fleet, I don't see the Minbari asking for help against this insignificant fleet of small ships.

**On board the Negh'Var.**

I managed to successfully reconfigure the matrix of the comm. array General, we will have some interferences but it is done." The klingon said very pleased with himself.

"Put it on screen." Tanas commanded.

Moments later on the main viewscreen appeared a figure that as far as Tanas could tell was human; the only characteristic he had never seen before on any other human was the strange hairstyle in the form of a crest.

"_**I'm Admiral Durano Marray supreme commander of the Centauri Imperial navy, identify yourself." **_Said the figure.

"I am a General Tanas of the Klingon Empire, we are looking for several of our ships that came to this Quadrant, have you seen them?"

"**_I cannot say that I have, also I never encounter anyone of your race before so what purpose those ships had to came to this Quadrant and why are you looking for them?" _**Admiral Marray asked.

"We are not from this Quadrant and the reason why our ships came here and we are looking for them is a matter that only concerns us." Tanas said bluntly.

"**_We were told that a new dangerous race was arriving and that they would bring much destruction, so unless you can convince us that you are not them I would have to retain you here until your identity is confirmed by our allies."_** Marray said convinced the alien would easily comply without any protest due to his far superior number of ships and their size.

"Are you threatening us with your pitiable ships? Then you will fell our wrath in all its might and the meaning of what a true warship is." Said a threatening Tanas.

"The Centauri Admiral was shocked with the audacity of the alien.

"**_You must be truly mad for dare making threats to the great Centauri Empire with your tiny fleet and undersized ships." _**Marray said absolutely certain of the superiority of his fleet.

"Size and numbers are irrelevant, I scanned your entire fleet and it's beyond pathetic to any standards, even now in their weak state the Cardassians would offer a better challenge." Tanas answered with scorn and then gave an order to someone outside the screen and moments later one hundred and twenty-five ships suddenly appeared behind the Centauri fleet.

**On board the Centauri Command Ship.**

The sudden appearance of all those ships caused waves of distress through the entire Centauri fleet.

"Admiral, Admiral many ships appeared behind us from nowhere." Captain Lotoru shouted clearly alarmed.

"Cut communications." Marray Commanded. "How did those ships get this close without being detected?"

"Unknown admiral one moment it wasn't nothing there and the next moment they just appeared from nowhere." Lotoru said.

"Open communications again." Commanded Marray that then address to Tanas. "I don't know how you did that trick but you fleet is no match to us, if you don't surrender immediately you will be destroyed." Marray said trying to appear convincing in his speech.

**_"A Klingon warrior is always ready for a good battle and doesn't fear death, now let's see if your courageous words have any meaning or are like the last growl of a Targ being slaughtered." _**Tanas said with a deadly grin and ended the transmission.

"Admiral the energy readings of the alien ships raised tremendously and the majority of our scans start being deflected." Captain Lotoru said nervously.

"BATTLE STATIONS, BATTLE STATIONS FIRE ALL WEAPONS AT WILL." Admiral Marray Yelled.

**Meanwhile on other location others events were about to happen.**

"Captain we are entering in the solar system corresponding to the coordinates that" Q" supplied. Data said with its impassive voice.

"Thank you Data, let's slow to impulse power and be ready for whatever may be there." Picard Said.

"Captain I am detecting several powerful minds and they are clearly angry with our presence here, I think that they are going to attack us at any moment." Troy said

"Red alert, sensor at maximum." Picard commanded.

"Energize phasers and load all torpedo launchers." Riker complemented.

In the next following moments the Enterprise crew bridge was invaded by anxiety due to the news of the possible imminent threat, suddenly in the front of the Federation starship three spatial apertures begin forming.

"Three wormholes forming on coordinates 093 mark 187 and from them three unknown ships are exiting." The tactical Official said.

"On main viewer and hail them." Picard said

Immediately on the main viewscreen three large unknown ships were visible, they were cylindrical in form with four protuberant structures at the front resembling some sort of tentacles with arcs of energy emanating from them.

"Captain the sensors read those ships as organics and their energy readings are sky-rocketing, I believe those frontal structures are weapons about to fire and I don't think the Enterprise will be able to survive their combined power." Lieutenant Warner said from his tactical console.

"Have we had any answers to our hails Mr. Data?" Picard asked.

"Not yet sir, so far I was not able of determine if our greetings were received or just ignored." Data answered.

"They are going to attack us now Captain." Deanna Troy shouted.

"Evasive maneuver Kirk epsilon now Mr. Balkan." Picard ordered.

Immediately the Enterprise began to angle to starboard but only avoiding one of three powerful discharges of energy while the other two struck the secondary hull making the shields of the Sovereign class ship to flare brightly during a second before failing.

Inside to Enterprise chaos was everywhere with consoles and plasma conduits blowing all over and throwing crewmembers through the air.

"STATUS REPORT." Picard shouted amid the also chaotic bridge.

"Ventral and port shields are down and we have hull breaches on the deck fifteen through seventeen Captain." Warner said.

"Turn the ship forty five degrees to port and return fire." Picard commanded.

Immediately the Enterprise began firing its phasers in rapid succession hitting the alien ships and making the colors of their hulls changing to a darker color where they were hit and them erupting in small explosions.

"We manage to do some damages in the their ships Captain but not near enough to incapacitate any of them and now they are closing on us from behind." Warner said.

"Fire aft torpedoes." Riker ordered.

The fingers of the tactical Officer flew over the buttons on his console inputting targeting data and a second later three torpedoes exit from the rear of the Federation ship closing fast on the following ships.

Two of the pursuers seeing the danger turned quickly to escape the incoming torpedoes but the remaining one in an act of arrogance refused to take evasive actions from weapons fired by a younger race ship and decided to intercept the approaching glowing projectiles with its powerful weapon.

When the powerful energy beam reached the lead torpedo the Vorlon expected it to disappear quickly but to his amazement that was not what happened as the torpedo shields resisted the powerful beam for full two seconds before being overwhelmed.

Unfortunately for the Vorlon those two seconds did all the difference as allow the torpedo to get too close before the detonation and the resultant photonic shockwave hit Vorlon dreadnought with an incredible destructive force causing tremendous damages to the hull and tearing apart the frontal structures from the rest of the ship.

At first the meddling of this young race ship in their space had irritated them but after seeing their companion being almost destroyed that simple irritation change to pure hatred.

"Captain one ship is disabled but the other two are closing on our flanks." Lt. Warner said

"Mr. Balkan take us into warp six any heading now." Picard said.

The helmsman promptly inserted the appropriate commands but nothing happened.

"Sir I'm unable to get us into warp." Ensign Balkan replied.

"Geordi what is happening, we need to go to warp now." Riker asked to the Chief Engineer.

"The last attack blew half the relays in engineering Commander, I need at least two minutes before I can give you warp." Laforge said.

"We don't have two minutes Geordi." Riker replied.

"There is nothing I can do about that commander, a main plasma conduit blew in engineering injuring or killing half of my staff, I simply don't have the manpower to replace the relays sooner." LaForge Said with a stressed voice.

Resigned to not having warp Picard issued a new order "Ensign engage Heading 027 mark 760 at my command." Picard said to the helmsman and then he addressed the tactical Officer. "Mr. Warner on my Commander fire a volley of torpedoes from the aft launcher and set them to detonate at ten thousand meters from the Enterprise, the explosion should blind the sensors of the ship that is approaching from our port for couple seconds."

"Aye captain"

"Now." Picard shouted.

Immediately the Enterprise made a sharp turn and fired a volley of torpedoes from the rear launcher detonating them at the pre-determinate location.

"Torpedo Launcher two full spread and maximum yield now."

"Firing now captain." Warner said.

As ordered the Enterprise forward number two torpedo launcher fired a volley of six photon torpedoes against the Vorlon ship approaching from starboard, caught unprepared by the sudden tactic the Vorlon was not able to even try the slightest evasive maneuver, a second later three torpedoes found its mark and the Vorlon Dreadnought exploded in a Million pieces.

The Vorlon on board the remaining operational ship upon seeing the dreadful event waste no time and immediately fired his deadly weapon with catastrophic consequences for the federation starship.

On the interior of the Enterprise as in the previous attack destruction was everywhere but this time on a much higher scale, then all over the ship most lights went off and only emergency lighting was seen.

"Captain we lost main power, weapons, shields and impulse power, we are sitting ducks." Lt. Warner said to Picard with apprehension in his voice.

Nearby the Vorlon on board his powerful dreadnought was pleased with his last action and again powered it's mighty weapon to deliver the final blow to those that had dare brought death to his people and there was nothing that no one could do to stop him.

TBC


	9. Reunion

**Chapter 9**

"Captain, we will exit the wormhole in five seconds…four…three…two…one…zero." As soon as Harry Kim finished the countdown, the Federation starship USS Voyager exited the wormhole into interstellar space.

"Captain, we are now further from the Alpha Quadrant than we were before. It seems that Q lied to us" Kim stated, totally disappointed.

"That's a shock," Tom Paris answered sarcastically from his helm console.

A soft sound attracted Tuvok's attention to the tactical console.

"Captain, sensors are detecting three vessels in the vicinity, the nearer two are approximately ten kilometers from our starboard bow while the other is much more distant," Tuvok said with his unemotional voice. After a more thorough scan, the Vulcan raised his right eyebrow to add, "One of the vessels appears to be of Federation design. If I remember correctly, it appears to be a Sovereign-class. That class of vessel whoever, was still in development when Voyager was commissioned."

"Five years has passed, so perhaps that class of ship is already on active duty. But, that doesn't explain how they got here to the Delta Quadrant," Chakotay said to nobody in particular.

"It seems to be badly damaged. The other vessel appears to be preparing to fire upon it," Tuvok stated.

"Everyone's questions will have to wait. If that ship is really from the Federation, we cannot allow it to be fired upon. RED ALERT! Mr. Tuvok, fire a warning shot across the attacking ship's bow. Mr. Paris, put us between the two ships," Janeway ordered.

"Yes, Ma'am," Paris replied.

Voyager made a quick turn to starboard and fired a phaser beam, which passed extremely close to the dreadnought's prow, clearly catching the Vorlon's attention. Then, it stopped between both ships.

"Mr. Kim, hail that ship," Janeway commanded.

"Hailing now, Captain," Harry Kim acknowledged and started entering the appropriate commands.

"Captain, the registration of the Sovereign-class vessel is NCC 1701-E, U.S.S. Enterprise," Tuvok said after reading the display on his console.

"That is not possible; everyone knows that the Enterprise is a Galaxy class vessel. This must be another trick from Q," Kim declared.

In spite of the newly arrived ship's smaller size its design was similar to the larger one, so the Vorlon immediately decided they had been built by the same race.

"No reply to our hails yet, Captain," Kim informed Janeway.

"Captain, the unknown vessel is firing on us," Tuvok declared. In the next instant, the Vorlon dreadnought's powerful energy beam hit the small Federation starship, throwing it backwards in an out-of-control spin as if it was a leaf whirling in the wind.

"Captain, shields are at twenty percent and the unknown vessel is about to fire again. We will not survive another hit," Tuvok stated with his usual unemotional voice as if this were not a dangerous situation.

"We wouldn't have survived the first one if it weren't for the enhanced Borg shields," Kim interjected while grabbing his console to avoid falling to the floor.

"Mr. Paris, execute evasive maneuver theta-four now! Mr. Tuvok, fire at will," commanded a very pissed Captain Janeway.

Tom Paris managed to regain control of the seven hundred thousand ton ship in record time due to his exceptional piloting skills and made a quick dive, allowing Voyager to partially avoid the deadly incoming beam. However, the glancing shot still did plenty of damage in the form of large breach on the top of the saucer section. Only with great difficulty was Paris able to regain control of the ship. But Voyager immediately repaid the favor by firing a rapid succession of phaser beams and torpedoes at the Vorlon ship.

The Vorlon ship had begun evasive maneuvers immediately after it fired upon the younger race ship so it was able to avoid some of the phaser and torpedo fire. However not all, and it became badly damaged by the shots that did manage to hit it.

Meanwhile several consoles had exploded on Voyager's bridge filling the room with heavy smoke.

"Captain, we successfully hit the unknown vessel badly damaging it, but we aren't in much better shape ourselves. That glancing shot was enough to disable our shields and make a large hull breach on decks three, four and five. Warp drive is also offline. Despite its large size, that vessel is almost as agile as we are, and definitely carries powerful firepower." Tuvok stated.

Now Voyager and the Vorlon dreadnought were in a standoff as both ships were too damaged to continue the confrontation without risking destruction, but Captain Janeway was not going to run and leave the Enterprise defenseless without first confirming whether it was real or another trick from Q.

On the Vorlon's side its communications system was damaged so it could not call for reinforcements, but it was also not going to leave and let the drifting dreadnought at the mercy of the younger race ships.

Meanwhile the Enterprise had been closely following nearby events.

"Lieutenant Warner, what is the condition of both ships?" Picard asked.

"It's difficult to tell Captain, as our sensors effectiveness has been degraded by battle damage, but both ships appear to be badly damaged although remaining partially operational," the Tactical Officer replied.

"Geordi, report. How are things in engineering, and how long will it be until we have main power back online?" Riker asked.

"I wish I could tell you Commander. I may be able to give you partial power in about half an hour, but that is it. Things are so messed up down here that it looks like a hurricane passed through," the Chief Engineer said.

"Do what you can, Geordi. For now, we seem to have a break, but I don't know for how long. Riker out."

"What can you tell me about that Federation ship, Mr. Data?" Picard asked.

"It is the USS Voyager, NCC-74656 Intrepid-class; commanded by a Captain Kathryn Janeway. According to Starfleet records, until recently was considered missing as it had disappeared five years ago in the Badlands, while on a mission to apprehend some Maquis.But then ten months all changed when in very unusual circumstances Starfleet came to know that they were still alive. Happened that they had been transported deep into the Delta Quadrant, seventy thousand light years away. An alien entity called Caretaker had been the responsible for that."

"How did they manage to send a signal to Starfleet from that far?" Riker inquired.

"Records say that they come across with a very powerful and ancient alien communications array." Data replied.

"And now they are here, just in time to save our butts, but what are the odds of that happen?" A completely baffled, and suspicious Riker asked.

"Somehow, I think Q may have something to do with it Number one. That wormhole they came from has surprising similarities to the one that brought us here from the Alpha Quadrant," Picard said.

"Do you think that ship may not be real but is instead one of Q's tricks, Captain? Riker asked.

"So far it has been real enough to prevent us from being destroyed, Number One. Mr. Data, do we have communications?" Picard asked.

"Short-range only, Captain." Data answered.

"Hail Voyager so we can try to get some answers," Picard said.

"Yes Captain, hailing them now," Data replied.

Moments later, a female figure with slightly messy hair appeared on the main viewscreen.

"Greetings Captain Janeway, many thanks for the assistance. Without it, we would certainly have been destroyed by now," Picard said.

"**_You are welcome, Captain Picard. Who are those aliens that were firing on you, and how did you arrive here in the Delta Quadrant? And also, sorry for asking this, but why a new Enterprise?"_** Janeway asked.

"In regarding the aliens identity or their reasons for attack us, your guess is as good as mine, captain. As to how we arrived here, it's a bit complicated. But basically, the culprit was a powerful being who goes by the name of Q. About the Enterprise-D, it was destroyed in battle three years ago. Now about you, According to Starfleet records, five years ago Voyager was transported from the Badlands to the Delta Quadrant, but the Quadrant is a very big place, how happened you to come here exactly when we more needed?" Picard asked, and noticed the exchange of looks between Janeway and her crew after he mentioned the name Q.

"**_It appears that we have much in common, Captain we have also had previous encounters with Q, and he is also the reason why we are here now. I'll gladly tell you all about it, but now I think we have more urgent matters to attend to,"_** Janeway replied.

"I agree Captain; above all we need to develop a strategy as quickly as possible in case more aliens arrive. May not be safe to talk over subspace. Do you mind if we discuss our next course of action here on the Enterprise?" Picard asked.

"**_Not at all Captain Picard. The first Sovereign-class had not been commissioned five years ago, so I am eager to see how it looks on the inside. I will be there shortly. Janeway out."_** The transmission ended.

"Mr. Warner, the Bridge is yours. Continue hailing the alien vessel, maybe we still can reason with them. Mr. Data, Counselor, come with me. Number One, please go to Transporter Room one to receive Captain Janeway and accompany her to the briefing room," Picard said.

"I'm on my way, Captain." Riker replied.

Minute's later, three figures materialized on the transporter pad of the Enterprise.

"I'm pleased to meet you, Captain Janeway. I'm Commander Riker, First Officer of the Enterprise. Please follow me, as Captain Picard is expecting us in the briefing room," Riker said to Janeway as he extended his hand to greet her.

"I'm pleased to meet you too, Commander. This is Lieutenant Tuvok, my Chief Tactical Officer and Seven of Nine."

"I'm pleased to meet you too," Riker greeted Janeway's companions, who returned the greeting.

"Seven of Nine, that is a very unusual name isn't it?" Riker asked, very intrigued while staring at Seven of Nine's implants.

"It's my Borg designation, and it is how I prefer to be called," Seven replied in a flat tone of voice.

"Did you just say Borg?" Riker asked slightly alarmed.

"Seven was a Borg drone whom we rescued from the collective. She is now a valuable member of my crew," Janeway said trying to clarify the matter, seeing that Riker was somewhat alarmed.

Riker did not pursue that topic further, but he couldn't stop paying extra attention to the beautiful blond woman with Borg implants and a tight blue jumpsuit, asking himself how Captain Picard would react to it. All four exited the transporter room and started towards the briefing room.

**Location: Delta Quadrant, in orbit of the Earth Alliance Homeworld.**

On the thousands of ships gathered around Earth rumors had quickly spread that the newly arrived aliens had decided to help them fight the Minbari and gone to face three Minbari warships on the edge of the solar system. People everywhere began speculating about the results of such a confrontation. While many people wanted to believe that the Klingons in their small ships had a small chance of winning such a battle, the great majority weren't that optimistic.

That mood quickly changed when four Klingon warships entered Earth orbit towing a Minbari frigate. Seeing their new allies returning safe and sound with a severely damaged Minbari ship was beyond their wildest expectations. When the word began to spread, tens of thousands of people in orbit and millions in the planet below began to celebrate; some even had tears of the happiness in their faces.

**In the Holodeck on board the IKS Kahless.**

In the last several hours Shelby had shown Sheridan wonders he'd never thought he'd see in his whole life. Currently they were on a holographic simulation of the Federation Earth Spacedock's recreation room. Sheridan was speechless on the magnificence of the place.

"This is incredible, the guys on Earth aren't going to believe me unless they see this place with their own eyes," Sheridan said.

"That can be arranged. Not to the entire Earth population naturally, but certainly to President Levy and a few other people. I don't think that Brigadier Korras will oppose a visit here to the Holodeck," Shelby answered.

Suddenly Shelby's comm. badge emitted a soft sound.

"Shelby here," she said after tapping the badge.

"**_Commander Shelby, we have arrived. Take the Human Commander to the transporter room. He is expected on the surface of the planet."_** Korras said.

"We're on our way, Sir. Shelby out."

"I guess its time for you to go home, Commander," Shelby said.

"I guess it is. When do you think it will be possible for us to inspect the Minbari Ship?" Sheridan asked.

"Probably as soon as we reestablish its environmental systems," Shelby replied.

Half a day later at the Earth Alliance Headquarters in Geneva, the Joint Chiefs of Staff headed by Chairman General Robert Lefcourt were having an emergency meeting.

"Gentlemen, we are gathered here to discuss our next course of action. One day ago, we were without any hope, facing the end of Mankind at the hands of the Minbari. Suddenly, the Klingons appeared from nowhere. All of you have read Commander Sheridan's report on what happened there, and how the Klingons faced and defeated a Minbari force that would have effortlessly obliterated any Earth Force fleet. Does anyone have any comments on this?" General Lefcourt asked the audience.

"What is their position on selling us weapons?" General Carmo asked.

"For the time being, they have not specified how are going to help," Lefcourt answered.

"What kind of allies are they? Defeating three Minbari ships is nothing to the boneheads. They have thousands of ships and still can steamroll us at any moment. We have to have those weapons to defend ourselves," General Tomko declared.

"What do you suggest that we do, General Tomko? Do you want us to force them to hand over their weapons?" Lefcourt asked.

"If the need arises, yes."

"Really? If they are that much more powerful than the Minbari, we would be replacing an enemy that can erase Mankind completely with another that can do it even more easily," Lefcourt said, not liking the implication of such suggestion.

"There are ways and there are ways, General Lefcourt. By their own words, they are far from their territories and they have only four ships. When the rest of them come and find out what we have done, we will have already strengthened our forces to the extent that no one else will want to go to war with us," General Tomko replied.

"General Tomko, I'm not a man that often uses harsh words, but I have to say that you are a moron." Lefcourt said.

"I protest being called a moron, General," Tomko vociferated.

"What do you want me to call you, then? You are suggesting that we steal technology from the only race that is willing to help us, as well as suggesting that if we, by any chance manage to be successful in doing that, we will then be able to defend ourselves from any force that they may have. Does this make sense to anyone besides you?" Lefcourt asked and then continued.

"We have no clue how their weapons work, which materials they use or even if we would be able to duplicate them. Assuming all of that is plain stupidity. Brigadier Korras will be arriving here soon to tell us what plans he has to stop the Minbari. Let's stop the speculation and stick to more productive topics."

"Maybe we could use a telepath to discreetly scan their minds and find out their secrets," General Romanoff suggested.

"TELEPATHS? Are you serious? I wouldn't trust a telepath any more than an alien. If they managed to find anything useful, they'd probably hide it from us," General Martel interjected.

"I think you are overreacting, General Martel. It's true that there's little love lost between telepaths and normal humans, but I don't think they would go that far," Romanoff replied.

"In that case, please tell us about the last time any telepath put the interests of non-telepaths in front of their own? Hell, I'm certain that anything they could discover would only be used on behalf of their own kind, and they'd happily let the rest of Mankind perish," Martel said.

"I agree with General Martel. We have no way to check if the telepaths were being honest with us," Tomko added.

"The main question is what we're going to do if the Klingons don't give us any weapons, just roll over and die?" General Carmo asked.

"I think that all of you are jumping to conclusions. Let's hear what Brigadier Korras has to say about this and then discuss it." Lefcout said trying to ease the tension.

"What about those other Humans of the United Federation of Planets? They may be more receptive to helping us," Carmo said.

"We don't know if those Humans really exist, or if it is only a hoax. If they do exist, they could only be puppets of the Klingons and are probably not willing or able to help us," Tomko said.

"And what about all that Commander Sheridan saw in that holographic room?" Carmo asked.

"If that Holographic room can do everything that Commander Sheridan described, then it can also easily manufacture something that isn't true. Also, the Klingons' suspiciously good timing could easily be a ruse to cause us to lower our defenses," Tomko said

"Sorry General Tomko, but I'm not buying that. If they can defeat the Minbari, they can defeat us even more easily even with all our defenses up," Carmo said.

"Who knows how aliens think! Just because they're advanced doesn't mean that they have a lot of resources. They may just want to do it in a simpler way, who knows?" Tomko Replied.

"If they don't have many resources to deal with us, why would they risk pissing off the Minbari? Sorry, but that doesn't make any sense," Carmo replied.

"Like I said before, who knows how aliens think. I just don't trust them. To put things mildly, anyone that does is being naive," Tomko said.

"General Lefcourt, on the humans of this supposed Federation of Planets Commander Sheridan's report is not as extensive as it should be. In order for us to have a better assessment of the situation, perhaps he could come here so that we could clarify certain aspects," General Martel requested.

"This can be easily arranged. I thought that you should want to question him, so he's waiting outside now," Lefcourt said as he pressed the button for the intercom. "Sergeant, please tell Commander Sheridan to enter. "

Moments later, Sheridan entered the room and saluted all the brass.

"At ease Commander, some of us present wish to question you on some of the points in your report," Lefcourt said.

"I will try to clarify any doubts as best I can, General," Sheridan replied.

TBC


	10. Together we stand

Chapter 10 

Tens of thousands of ionized plasma bolts fired by hundreds of Centauri warships crossed the vacuum of the interstellar space and plunged directly into the Klingon fleet, causing fireballs everywhere after impacting on the shields. To an outside observer, the scene resembled an immense display of fireworks, as beautiful as it was deadly.

To the utter astonishment of the Centauri, their fierce attack left only a handful of Klingon ships damaged or destroyed, not the hundreds of ships they had expected.

Before the stunned Centauri fleet could recover from their less-than-successful attack, both halves of the Klingon fleet jumped into the fight with a vengeance, immediately and without surprise the tremendous rain of disruptor fire and torpedoes began causing immense destruction among the Centauri ranks. Dozens and dozens of Primuses, Vorchans and Sentris were destroyed (or if the crew was lucky, merely damaged) every second.

"Admiral, we were caught in a crossfire. Our ships are being destroyed effortlessly while their ships seem significantly resistant to our weapons," Captain Lotoru said.

"How can such a thing be possible? Not even a Minbari fleet could have sustained so little damage after the amount of fire we unleashed. What are our sensors saying about their ships? There must be a way to counter whatever it is they are using to protect themselves," Admiral Marray asked.

"We are having difficulty in scanning their ships, but from what I've been able to discern they seem to be using some sort of energy shields that can somehow deflect our weapons fire," Captain Lotoru answered.

"Launch all fighters. Let's use our superior numbers to our advantage. Order all ships to form in groups. Each group should concentrate all weapons on a single alien ship. The increased firepower should be enough to overcome their energy shields," Admiral Marray said.

"Right away, Admiral," Lotoru acknowledged and then went to the main control panel to dispatch the orders.

Ships of all types were turning frantically in all directions and due the intense weapons fire nobody could avoid being hit for long. Amidst all that fire, the Centauri were clearly losing the battle. Anywhere they looked, one of their ships was being destroyed. However, the Klingons had only lost a few dozen ships to damage or destruction so far.

**On board the IKS Negh'Var. **

"General, the enemy is changing their strategy, multiple ships are now concentrating fire on each of ours in an attempt to overwhelm our shields," The ops officer said.

"Order all ships to fight at close range; that will neutralize their tactic," Tanas ordered.

"General, at that range we won't be able to use torpedoes without risking collateral damage," the weapons officer said.

"Use disruptors only, against their pitiful ships they will be more than enough," Tanas replied harshly.

"General, we're wasting our time here and losing ships we can't replace later. We didn't come here for this," Worf said.

"Have you lost your sense of honor? A true klingon cannot allow an alien's insult to go unanswered! Have those years among humans watered down your Klingon blood so much?" Tanas asked, clearly aggravated.

"No, but you should remember that there is more at risk than honor. The whole Empire is at stake. We have no idea of what we could encounter in the future, so wasting resources this way is imprudent," Worf replied.

"We can deal with whatever we encounter out there. A Klingon who doesn't value honor isn't a true Klingon! We're going to finish this and punish them for their audacity so I don't want to hear another word on this matter, Ambassador!" Tanas threatened.

The battle had developed into two fleets trying to counter each other's tactics, the Centauri ships forming groups to increase their chances of piercing the Klingons' shields, while the Klingons were trying to get closer to the Centauri ships to negate their greater numbers.

**On board the Centauri Command ship.**

"Admiral, the enemy is now fighting so close to us that we're risking hitting ourselves while firing on them. We've already lost almost half of our fleet, and many of the ships that still can continue fighting are badly damaged. We need to withdraw while we can, or the entire fleet will be destroyed," Captain Lotoru said to Admiral Marray.

"This is madness! We can't be defeated this easily," Marray mumbled.

"Admiral, please listen to me. Certainly, these must be the aliens the Minbari were talking about. If they had to ask for our help to fight them, it's no wonder we're being defeated. We must withdraw now," Captain Lotoru begged to Admiral Marray.

Marray thought about it for a moment and finally said, "all right, tell the fleet to break off and jump."

Captain Lotoru immediately transmitted the order to the entire Centauri fleet. Within seconds, the fleet veered away from the battlefield and opened hundreds of jump points. Unfortunately, many Centauri Captains wanted to reach the safety of the hyperspace so much that they ordered their ships to open jump points without caring what was in the way. As a result, many vortexes formed in areas crowded by both friendly and enemy ships, which were immediately ripped apart by the powerful energy eddies.

**On board the IKS Negh'Var.**

"General, the enemy fleet is creating some sort of wormholes to escape from us. What should we do?" The ops officer asked.

Before Tanas could answer, the communications officer informed him that Captain Kurn's Bird of Prey on the far side of the battlefield was reporting the existence of additional wormholes forming, with wave after wave of unidentified ships exiting.

"Show me!" Tanas ordered.

Immediately, hundreds of large unidentified dagger-shaped ships exiting from vortexes similar to those used by the Centauri fleet appeared on the main viewer.

**On board the command ship of the new approaching fleet.**

"Warleader Ta'Lorn, a battle is being fought at the coordinates of our rendezvous point. The Centauri are fighting against unknown ships, different from anything we have on file. It appears that the Centauri were defeated, as they're trying to flee into hyperspace," a Narn officer said.

"Charge all weapons, activate electromagnetic defenses and launch fighters but do not attack until I give the order," Ta'Lorn commanded.

**On board the IKS Negh'Var.**

"Sir, the approaching ships are powering up their weapons and launching fighters," the weapons officer reported.

"Are you planning on fighting them as well?" Worf asked.

Tanas gave him an unfriendly glance, but said nothing. Then he asked the ops officer, "how much time until they arrive?"

"One minute at their present speed," the ops officer replied.

"What is our fleet's status?" Tanas asked.

"We've lost thirty-nine ships; twenty-seven are damaged to some extent and ten are unable to go to warp," The ops officer said.

**On board the Narn command cruiser.**

"All Centauri ships have jumped but several dozen ships were left behind, probably too damaged to open their own jump points or follow the other ships through the open jump points," the Narn officer reported.

"Typical Centauri cowardice to abandon their own kind," Ta'Lorn said.

**On board the IKS Negh'Var.**

"According to the tactical readings, these new ships have even more primitive technology than the Centauri. They don't even have artificial gravity or matter/antimatter reactors," the ops officer said.

"Aren't there any worthy adversaries in this part of the galaxy? I will not waste any more time with another second-rate race. Tractor one stranded enemy ship, beam its crew to the brig and let's go to warp," Tanas ordered.

"Why bring an enemy ship along?" Worf asked.

"We need to learn about that wormhole technology, it may prove to be invaluable," Tanas replied.

Seconds later, all the Klingon ships started disappearing in flashes of light, towing all their non-warp-capable ships plus one Centauri Vorchan.

**On board the Narn command cruiser.**

"Warleader, the unknown ships seem to have accelerated to and beyond the speed of light and then disappeared from our sensors," the Narn officer said, completely perplexed.

"What do you mean, they seem to be accelerating to and beyond the speed of light and then disappeared from our sensors?" Ta'Lorn asked.

"Exactly that, Warleader. I don't find anything wrong with the sensors, but that was what they registered, The Narn replied.

"What should we do now about the stranded Centauri?" another Narn asked.

The Warleader thought for a few seconds and then replied, "destroy them all. Leave no witnesses. If anybody asks about this, we'll say that the unknown aliens left no survivors."

Next, as the massive Narn fleet reached weapons range it unleashed all its weapons on the surviving Centauri ships, and in seconds they were reduced to small bits of floating debris.

**Enterprise-E's briefing room.**

"Welcome aboard, Captain Janeway," Picard said, instantly noticing Seven of Nine's implants.

"Thank you Captain, this is my tactical officer, Lieutenant Commander Tuvok and this is Seven of Nine," Janeway replied.

"SHE'S BORG," Picard said, flashing back in an instant to all the Borg-related events in his life, stunned that Janeway would bring a Borg aboard his ship without warning him.

"In spite of her implants, Seven is no longer linked to the Borg collective and is now a important crewmember of Voyager," Janeway said, surprised with Picard's outburst.

"That is beside the point. I would have preferred if you had informed me in advance," Picard said clearly upset.

"I didn't know that I needed to pre-approve my away team members," Janeway said, taken aback by Picard's behavior.

"Captain Janeway told me that you were once assimilated by the Borg. If my presence is making you uncomfortable, I will leave," Seven of Nine said.

"I'm sorry for my reaction, but seeing you brought back old memories I would prefer to forget. Please sit down so we can begin our discussion," Picard stated, and then continued.."You said that Q was also the responsible for your coming here? Why did he do it?" Picard asked.

"Have no idea, Captain, several hours ago he appeared on Voyager and reason his presence with wanting to make me a proposal that I couldn't refuse; I could either continue on our present course towards Earth and take decades or then go through a wormhole he created and according to him reach home much sooner. I understand perfectly well that his offer had something behind it and was risky, but since the path we have taken so far have had also many dangers, I decided to take the chance of possibly getting home earlier, so here we are. And how about you? How did you get here?" Janeway asked.

"This time things started with the Klingons, several weeks ago, much like he did to us at Farpoint, he put the Klingons on trial and force several of their ships to go through a wormhole to the Delta Quadrant to perform some sort of test. As you can probably imagine, in inimitable Klingon fashion their Council completely overreacted and decided to assemble a large fleet and search for the ships that come here. They apparently also knew that the Ambassador Worf had had prior encounters with Q, so asked him to accompany them so that they could benefit from his experience with how to deal with such a being.

"We then took Worf to Klingon territory, offered our help, and together with the Klingon fleet crossed the still-open wormhole and came here. Not much later, Q appeared and said that the Enterprise had not been invited to come here, and sent us here so we wouldn't interfere with his plans for the Klingons. When we arrived, we were attacked for no known reason by those aliens who so far have refused to answer our hails," Picard said.

"Everything indicates that by sending you here, Q knew you would be attacked and sent us to help. However I fail to comprehend his logic of why he endangered you if he didn't want you destroyed, or why he would bring us here under a false pretext instead of telling the truth. Shouldn't he be aware that we would never refuse to help the Enterprise?" Tuvok inquired.

"Technically, Q did not make a false claim. He said that if we entered the wormhole, we could reach Earth sooner, and if the wormhole that brought them here still exists, we could travel through it and reach the Alpha Quadrant much earlier than we would otherwise. From that point of view, what he said is correct," Seven replied to Tuvok.

"But why, since he never showed any interest before in shortening our travel time to Earth." Janeway replied.

"We won't get anywhere with this discussion of Q's intentions. Our primary goal must be to find the best way out of this unpleasant situation," Picard said.

"You're right, Captain Picard, so let's get started. Since these aliens seem to be deliberately refusing to communicate, I propose that we leave as soon as possible. How soon can the Enterprise get under way?" Janeway asked.

"Our chief engineer estimates that we should have impulse power soon, with partial shields and weapons following in one or two hours. Warp will take much longer. How is Voyager?" Picard asked.

"Despite serious damage to our main hull and the loss of warp drive and shields, our structural integrity is nominal. According to our Chief Engineer, we should have warp drive and shields back within thirty minutes," Janeway replied.

"That's good news. Mr. Data, what do we know about the aliens so far?" Picard asked.

"Their real-space propulsion system appears to be completely gravimetric, comparable in capabilities to our impulse engines. I do not have sufficient data to formulate a theory on how they arrived, since the vortexes from which they came were not open long enough for detailed scans. However, what little data we did obtain indicates that they lead to another dimension.

"Their weapons are extremely powerful, with an estimated yield of 500 isotons and a recharge time of 3.425 seconds to achieve maximum output. Their hulls are composed of an organic material that generates a bioelectrical field. I believe that a combination of the organic hull and the effects of the field may allow them to adapt to energy weapons, but its effectiveness is unknown at this time," Data said.

"Mr. Tuvok?" Janeway asked.

"I agree with Commander Data's assessment, but I would like also to include several other relevant facts. Those ships are extremely agile for their size and almost on par with small Federation vessels. However their extremely powerful weapons only cover their frontal arc, providing a weakness we can exploit. Their biological hulls, despite any adaptability they may exhibit, may work to our advantage. I spoke with Seven of Nine, and if we manage to acquire a sample of one of their hulls, we may be able to develop a weapon similar to the one used on species 8472," Tuvok informed.

"Who are Species 8472?" Riker asked

"They are an inter-dimensional race which the Borg tried to assimilate; species 8472 is their Borg designation. Unfortunately for the Borg, they proved to be too powerful to assimilate, so the Borg had their collective asses kicked hard and to withdraw back to our dimension. Unfortunately for the Borg, things didn't end there.

"Species 8472 followed them to our dimension and unleashed their entire wrath on the Borg, destroying hundreds of their planets and tens of thousands of cubes. Unfortunately, species 8472 also concluded that all other races in the galaxy were weak and should be exterminated. Fortunately, thanks to our Doctor we were able to modify some Borg nanoprobes we had into a weapon that successfully pushed them back to their dimension," Janeway stated.

"It's too bad that they turned out to be a hostile race. They would have been a blessing to the galaxy if they helped us get rid of the Borg," Riker said.

"Have you managed to feel anything more from the aliens, Counselor?" Picard asked.

"So far only their anger against us, and a vague sense that they think we're somehow interfering with their affairs," Troi answered.

"Interfering in what? They started firing as soon as we showed up. Why didn't they give us a warning of some kind? Not even the Tholians or the Sheliak are this unreasonable," Riker said.

"For some reason, they believe that we're a threat to them. I'm sorry Captain, but I can't be more specific," Troi replied.

"That's alright, Counselor. Somehow I have the felling that Q may also be the responsible for the aliens' wrath towards us, but unless we can reason with them and as Captain Janeway said, I think we should leave as soon as possible before more aliens arrive," Picard said.

"What about the Borg nanoprobe weapons that Commander Tuvok mentioned, Captain?" Riker asked.

"If all else fails, we may have to consider such a weapon. However, if at all possible we should avoid antagonizing the aliens further by firing on them with it," Picard said.

"If samples of their hull material are needed to adapt the weapon, it should be easy enough to obtain them. We only need to beam some debris aboard from one of the damaged or destroyed ships," Riker said, smiling.

"Since time is of the essence I think we should begin preparations immediately, unless you have other ideas, Captain?" Picard asked Janeway.

"No more ideas, Captain. I agree with you, and as soon as the Enterprise is able, we should put as much distance as possible between us and the aliens," Janeway said.

"Mr. Data, please assist Commander Tuvok however you can to begin preparing this weapon. If nobody else has anything to add, I declare this meeting adjourned," Picard stated.

As everybody started to stand up from their seats, a flash of light appeared in the middle of the room, and a familiar figure materialized.

"Well, well, what did I do to be so lucky? I was just passing by when, to my surprise, I saw my two favorite Captains. So I simply couldn't resist and had to pop in to say 'hello,'" Q said, grinning at the surprised officers.

TBC


	11. A new mission

**Chapter 11**

"Commander, your report on what happened out there was very detailed in many topics, but I think you failed in not having questioning Commander Shelby as much as possible on others issues, why is that?" Martel asked.

"With all due respect, Sir I believe that I questioned her as much as possible given the circumstances, I was there as a mere adviser and not in the position of being able to interrogate her at will without risking becoming unwelcome." Sheridan replied.

"I disagree with that reasoning Commander, risking becoming unwelcome would be a small price to pay for getting valuable information." Martel said.

Usually I would agree with you General but in this case there was no guarantees that Commander Shelby would answer more sensitive questions, and since she was being very helpful, antagonize her unnecessarily would only create difficulties in the future." Sheridan replied and then continued. "But what she told and showed me was so much that it is possible that I may have forgotten to mention something in the report, what is that the General wish to know?" Sheridan asked.

"In the report you stated that what allowed the Klingons to travel so far from their territories in such a short period was the fact that they stumbled into a wormhole with the capacity of shortening distances billions of times, but nowhere is its precise location mentioned, did you bother asking her where it was or didn't you think it would be important we know its location?" Martel asked.

"As a matter of fact I did ask her General, but Commander Shelby answered relative to its location was awfully vague." Sheridan replied.

"And doesn't seem strange to you that a so-called ally would be withholding crucial information from us?" Martel asked.

"I find it difficult to let the General know what is strange or not as that word is subjective to many interpretations, but since I'm certain that Earth Force is not going to disclose everything it knows to them we have to expect they do the same to us." Sheridan answered.

"On what side are you Commander?" Martel asked fuming due the evasive answers he was getting from Sheridan.

"I'm trying to respond to all your questions to the best of my abilities General, nothing more and nothing less, so I'm offended by your allegation regarding my loyalty." Sheridan replied.

"That's not what I'm seeing Commander!" Martel yelled.

"I'm sorry that you are getting the wrong idea from my answers General, but to be honest I fail to see how they can be interpreted as showing disloyalty." Sheridan replied.

"Commander," General Carmo wanting to change to another subject asked. "You briefly mentioned that before discovering that wormhole they were conducting military exercises regarding a powerful enemy called the Borg, didn't she elaborated more on them and how they may pose a threat to us with the Klingons coming here?"

"She mentioned that the Borg are the most ruthless and powerful enemy that they ever come across, in fact they're so powerful that a single one of their ships can destroy an entire fleet of hundreds of ships, fortunately and by reasons unknown so far, all Borg attacks were made only by single ships, this allowed the Federation at the cost of hundreds of ships and tens of thousands of crewmembers to avoid defeat. But calculating the probability of the Borg coming here is difficult, I would say that the possibilities of that happen are more if they find the wormhole by themselves and want to investigate what is on the other side, than getting the knowledge of it through the Klingons, because they don't seem the type that announces to everyone what they discover." Sheridan spoke.

"You said that the Federation lost many ships to the Borg, what about the Klingons? How many ships have they lost?" General Carmo asked wanting to know if klingons ships were more powerful than the Federation ones.

"Although the Klingons also feel threatened by the Borg, so far they only lost a few ships that went missing while patrolling their borders with the Federation and the Romulan Star Empire, all main attacks for the time being were only done against the United Federation of Planets, that may have to do with the fact that the Federation was the first one to have contact with the Borg, and going by what Commander Shelby said, and the way she said it, I got the impression that their meeting did not go very well. " Sheridan answered.

"Are you telling us that those Borg are to the Federation what the Minbari are to us?" General Romanoff asked.

"You may put things that way General." Sheridan said.

"Well we might as well forget the option of asking help from that Federation, apparently they have as much of a problem as we do." General Tomko said.

"Going by that and also by the Dominion war you mentioned in the report I would say that humans wherever they are always have the same tendencies to get into trouble." Lefcourt interjected.

"But if the Klingons are willing to help us, then shouldn't they also have helped the Federation when they were attacked since they're allegedly are allies?" Martel asked.

"In one of the attacks at least Shelby said that a Klingon fleet was on the way to help but the battle ended before their arrival, in other battles I don't know since she didn't enter in many details." Sheridan said.

Suddenly the intercom in the room came to live and from it a voice was heard.

_**"General, Brigadier Korras is signaling that he is ready to beam over, whatever that means."**_

"Good, let him know that we are ready and provide him the coordinates of this room." General Lefcourt ordered.

Moments later two columns of light appeared in the room and began to form into humanoids; General Lefcourt immediately got up from his chair and went to greet them.

"Welcome to Earth Force Headquarters Brigadier, Commander, we appreciate very much your coming here and also the Minbari ship that you brought us, the knowledge that we will get from it will be invaluable. Now please have a seat and let's begin the meeting." Lefcourt said.

"Good," Korras said and after he and Shelby sat down he continued ... "My captains and me have been discussing the best course of action to defend your planet from the Minbari; usually we would gather a fleet and would go fight the enemy, but since we have few ships and yours are too weak, that is not an option, so our best choice is to have a defensive posture and surround the planet with mines." Korras said.

"Mines? That is not going to delay the Minbari much." General Romanoff said.

"I don't know at what types of mines you are used to, but the ones that the Brigadier mentioned are extremely effective, it consists of a small casing fielded with a matter and antimatter warhead and fitted with their own independent sensors and thrusters, once a enemy ship enters its kill zone of twenty thousand kilometers, the mines tracks it, swarms it and detonate on contact." Shelby replied.

"It would be far more efficient if you sold us your weapons and sensors." General Martel said.

"That is an impossibility as our sensors and weapons are subspace based and can't be integrated in any of your systems." Korras said.

"Subspace, what is that?" Lefcourt asked.

"It is a spatial dimension that most of our technology uses in order to circumvent many of the restrictions to which matter and energy are subject in our dimension." Shelby answered.

"Like our hyperspace?" General Carmo asked.

"Yes, you can say that." Shelby replied.

"An immense number of mines would have to be used to be possible to obstruct all pathways to Earth... do you have that many? General Martel asked clearly doubting that that was the case.

"To protect a single planet as yours why would we need such a high quantity of mines? As commander Shelby already indicated, the mines will track any enemy ship in its kill radius and will destroy it, but in the very improbable case of the minefield be insufficient some planetary defense satellites will be provided." Korras said.

"Satellites? What we need is proper weapons that could be mounted in our ships so that we could fight the boneheads in our own terms." General Martel said.

"Are you questioning the methods we choose to help your doomed race by implying that they are not good enough?" Korras pounded the table with his fist and looked piercingly to Martel.

Lefcourt immediately understood that Martel last remark could make things go downhill and tried to act quickly to remedy the situation. "Of course not Brigadier, he only stated his own preferences, that are the use of offensive weapons."

"You should be grateful at all that we had decided to help you," Korras roared. "Or do you also think that I'm presenting worthless weapons and lack the knowledge of how to prepare myself for battle?"

"Of course not Brigadier, if I give you that impression I apologize, but that was not my intention." Lefcourt said alarmed.

Immediately Korras turned off his universal translator and began speaking with Shelby in Klingonese, and in spite of nobody in the room understand what it was being said, everyone felt it wasn't being said good words, then he and Shelby got up and went to the exact place where had been beamed in and disappeared in the same manner.

Immediately Lefcourt faced Martel in the eyes and said out loud. "DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA OF WHAT YOU MAY HAVE DONE?"

"Me? I just said what everyone thought but didn't have the courage to say." Martel replied.

"You knew very well after reading all those reports how easy they are to being felt insulted, now if they refuse to help us because of your big mouth what do you think will happen when the Minbari arrive? " Lefcourt asked.

"We should've done what I suggested initially instead of wasting all this time, and get by force all their worthy technology, their excuses about their weapons being incompatible with our systems are only that excuses so that we continue to be weak." Martel said.

"You are insane, and I begin to wonder if you didn't provoke him intentionally to compel us in despair to use your mad schemes. I will request immediately an emergency audience with President Levy and will ask her to accept your resignation as quickly as possible, because of your stupidity you may have doomed us all ... gentlemen this meeting is postponed until further notice." Then Lefcourt got up from his seat and exits the room with a very troubled look.

**On board the Kahless two figures materialized.**

"Brigadier are you really planning to leave?" Shelby asked.

"Yes, the pitiful humans don't deserve our help, they are lucky I don't bombard them myself." Korras replied.

"What about the mission Sir?" Shelby asked.

"What about it?" Korras asked aggravated.

"Are you returning to Qo'nos? And what about Q's threat? Shelby asked.

Upon hearing the name of Q Korras went ballistic and start punching the nearest console with pure rage.

"IF THAT Q BEING EVER COMES ONTO THIS SHIP AGAIN I WILL CRUSH HIS THROAT WITH MY BARE HANDS." Korras yelled.

Shelby gave a few steps back to avoid being near the enraged Korras and said smoothly.

"Sir I understand your anger towards Q, I don't like him neither but unfortunately we do not have the power to oppose him.

"WHAT DO YOU SUGEST THEN." Korras yelled.

Far from there at the Minbari, Centauri and Narn rendezvous point hundreds of Jump points started forming and from them a mighty Minbari fleet as wasn't seen in a thousand years immerged.

**On board the command Minbari ship**.

"Alyt, at the gathering point I'm only detecting the Narn fleet and a huge quantity of metallic debris, many are larger pieces that are undoubtedly consistent with remains of Centaury ships, a large battle clearly happened there." A Minbari informed his Alyt.

"Could it be the Narn dare defy us and used this opportunity to attack the Centauri?" The First officer asked.

Alyt Durhan carefully examined the data sent to his personal console and then answered. "It would be highly unlikely at all that the Narn could defeat the Centauri even if with far superiors numbers and the element of surprise, but doing it while remaining completely unscathed as their fleet appears to be would be an impossibility, hail the Narn command ship immediately."

Moments later a Narn appeared in the main holographic display.

"What happened here?" Durhan demanded to know.

Ta'Lorn immediately complied. **_"Greetings great Alyt, I'm Ta'Lorn supreme commander of this Narn fleet, I regret to inform you but those wreckage are what remains of the Centauri. Immediately after having arrived we witness the last moments of a battle between the Centauri and unknowns, and although our arrival was enough to scare them away and make them flee, it was too late to help the Centauri as none was left alive. Those unknowns may be the ones against whom you asked our help."_**

"Doubtful, if they were the our enemies they would have destroyed you as well and not run scared as you claim they did upon seeing you." Durhan said.

Ta'Lorn didn't like Durhan's insinuation but kept his objections to himself. **_"I don't know why Alyt, only that that was what happened, our sensor records can confirm it."_**

"Then send us those records immediately." Durhan ordered.

**_"Of course, I will send it to you without delay."_** Ta'Lorn said to the Minbari, then disconnected the transmission and addressed a Narn near him. "Transmit the records we previously prepared, quickly."

Moments later the data arrived its destination, and Durhan starting examining it meticulously. And as he already suspected and contrary to what the Narn had claimed the unknown ships that had destroyed the Centauri fleet weren't the dreaded Borg.

**Grey council chambers.**

_**"Satais, we have arrived at the gathering point, but I have disturbing news".**_ Was heard in the grey council speakers.

"What is it?" Coplann asked.

**_"Apparently the Centauri fleet waiting for us was destroyed by unidentified ships, the only thing left of them are debris."_** Durhan Said.

"Are you certain of that? Satai Morann asked.

**_"I'm afraid so Satai, the Narn claimed to have arrived in the last instances of the battle, hence witnessing what happened but unable to intervene or help as the unknowns immediately flee upon their arrival and no Centauri survivors were left behind, I am sending you the Narn records of the events for you to analyze."_** Durhan replied.

Moments later all the nine of the grey council began seeing in the holographic display hundreds unidentified ships amid the immense field of debris, suddenly it begun to move at incredible speeds and disappearing in flashes of light.

"This is madness, is the universe conspiring against us? Who are these new aliens? Will they be an enemy that the Centauri have and we are unaware off, or will they be linked to those Borg creatures that somehow knew of our plans and decided to make a preemptive attack to avoid our retaliation?" Delenn asked completely appalled with what it had just happened.

"Alyt, did you find any remains from the alien ships that did this? Satai Kersohio asked.

"We detected some unfamiliar remains that we brought aboard to examine Satai." Durhan stated.

"Good, as soon you found something about them contact us immediately." Kersohio replied.

"We must contact the Centauri home world immediately for clarification about what happened here, now with only the Narn we are not strong enough to assure a victory against those Borg abominations." Satai Kalonnon stated.

"Then what course of action will we take?" Satai Hedronn asked.

"I propose that we turn back and go seek Vorlon counseling." Satai Kalonnon suggested.

Minutes later the Narn were informed that the attack plan was suspended until further notice, and then all Minbari ships start veering away, opening hundreds of jump points and disappearing into the vastness of hyperspace.

**General Lefcourt office.**

"Excuse me General, did you asked for my presence?" Sheridan asked after passing the door and saluting Lefcourt.

"Yes I did, Klingons have refused to answer all our calls since that unfortunately incident you witness, the good news are they didn't leave orbit yet so we still have hope they'll continue to want to help us. But we can't gamble in that assumption only, so it was decided we should explore other possibilities, the EAS Lexington is currently being prepared for its next mission and you are its captain, Captain Sheridan." Lefcourt said.

"Thanks for the promotion Sir, may I ask what the mission is about?" Sheridan said.

"Yes you Can Captain. If everything else fails, this mission of yours is humanity last hope, thanks to General Martel we may no longer have the Klingons help, so our next best hope is to find this human Federation of Planets. Your mission is to try to find out the wormhole that brought the Klingons here, travel through it and try to contact them; I know they have their own problems with those Borg and all, but anything they could give us is better than what we have now. You have full negotiation powers, form an alliance with them ,or even if it came to it, ask for refuge to any surviving humans that manage to escape if the Minbari do attack Earth and win, its your call."

"That is a big responsibility Sir, I don't know if I'm up to it." Sheridan replied.

"If you aren't then none is, Captain. Believe me when I say that you are the best man for the job, and I have the maximum confidence in you, if anyone is capable of doing it, you are." Lefcourt said.

"Thanks for the confidence general, but the area to cover is immense, and even if we succeed in detecting and crossing that wormhole we no longer will be able to navigate in hyperspace, certainly there aren't any nav beacons out there that far, and in real space we can not cover any meaningful distance in any useful amount of time." Sheridan said.

"I know that captain but maybe for a change we can get lucky and you will stumble into one of their ships. In any case that is not our plan, your ship as we speak is being fitted with a Minbari communications array removed from the captured ship and additional fusion reactors to power it, once you hopefully find and exit the wormhole you are to use that communications array to transmit a distress call to the Federation, Minbari systems are far more powerful than anything we have, with luck they may listen and show up." Lefcourt said.

"A mission with more "ifs" and "hoping for luck" than this one would be difficult to find Sir." Sheridan replied.

"Unfortunately Captain, "ifs" and "luck" is the only thing now that could prevent humanity from being annihilated ... dismissed, and good luck Captain Sheridan.

"Yes Sir." Sheridan said saluting Lefcourt and then leaving his office.

**Somewhere in Geneva two figures meet in an undisclosed place.**

"I'm glad you accepted coming to this meeting General, I heard that President Levy replaced you in the Joint Chief of Staffs by General Hermann Ruff."

"You asked me to come here to rub that in my face, Senator?" Martel asked fuming.

"Of course not General, I think that what they did to you was an injustice, we should have more people like you in decision places" The Senator replied.

"You bet it was, President Levy, Lefcourt and the others yes men are going to be our deaths with their spineless policies, none of them have the courage to do what has to be done." Martel replied with resentment in his voice.

"I agree entirely with you General, and believe me that there are more people that think as you do, and I'm one of them. Me plus a group of courageous people whom I lead are willing to do whatever is needed to save humanity, and we think you would be a great addition to our group. Can I count on you General?" The Senator asked.

"That is a very interesting proposition Senator, please tell me more about this group of yours, and your plans." Martel asked with a smile of satisfaction.

TBC


	12. Deceiving appearances

**Chapter 12**

"I see that your precious ships are not as shiny and pristine as usual, how sloppy of you!" Q said in a scornful tone.

"You know very well what happened, Q, so spare me your cheap mockery!" Picard replied harshly.

"I see that you are a little cranky today Jean-Luc? Did you miss your beauty sleep? You should be happy, after all I just got you two together, but instead of hearing a "thanks" or a "how was your day Q", all I hear are accusations. If you wish to blame someone, blame yourself for your shortcomings!" Q said

"My shortcomings had nothing to do with what happened, Q, you were the one that forced us to come here, and I have no doubt that you knew exactly what was going to happen!" Picard vociferated towards Q.

"As I remember, I gave you the chance to go back, but did you accept it? No, so don't blame me for your bad decisions." Q said, clearly enjoying the exchange of words.

"And as Captain Picard refused to go back, you forced him to come here, so how is not your fault?" Janeway asked.

"The facts are very clear and speak for themselves my dear, although I cannot say that I'm surprised that you don't recognize them." Q replied.

"Nice dodge Q." Riker said sarcastically about how Q avoided answering Janeway's question.

"Hah, the always witty Riker, the perfect example of human ineptitude and lack of vision, who else would have been dumb enough to refuse my gift of turning him into a superior being." Q replied.

"Being a superior being is overrated; I prefer to continue being just who I am!" Riker replied.

"Of course you prefer to, your limited perception so typical of lesser beings, doesn't let you perceive what you lost, tell me, did you let your beard grow just to look smarter?" Q joked.

"You know the old saying, Q, power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely; and you are the perfect example of that, a powerful being whose sole purpose is to torment, terrorize and force weaker beings to participate in his twisted and perverse games, so thanks, but no thanks!" Riker replied.

"This can be a surprise to you, but I meet the very human who come up with that stupid saying, and even by human standards he was pretty dumb, so you quoting him doesn't exactly make you look intelligent." Q replied.

"Well if he met you, it's no surprise he came to such conclusions." Riker retorted to Q while displaying a smiling.

"Well, since humans are known to be so narrow-minded, that they can't recognize even the most elemental facts, his opinion doesn't mean much, does it? If you could see me through enlighten eyes, you would see what I really am, a shinny beacon of light that brings splendor and purpose to your pathetic lives; …really, who in his right mind would want to be a human, having had the choice to be something else, … Well, maybe paleface over there would, but he is a machine and doesn't know any better." Q said, referring to Data.

"I remind you that once, even you chose to be a human, so does that make you narrow-minded?" Data Inquired.

"Hah, the human wannabe speaks." Q replied.

"Am I not correct in my statement? On stardate 43539.1 when you were expelled from the Q Continuum; stripped of all your powers and forced to choose another form as long it was mortal, you had chosen to be a human." Data said.

"That wasn't one of my finest moments I'll admit it, but in my defense I have to say that the Q continuum only give me a fraction of a second to choose which mortal form I would like to be turned to. But instead of questioning my motives, what you really should have done, was to express gratitude for having had once again my always awe-inspiring presence among you; even if as a mere human, bear in mind that I could have easily selected the company of far superior live forms, who gladly would have worshipped the very ground I thread upon." Q said.

"Yeah, right! I have yet to encounter a being that doesn't hate your guts, much less worship you!" Riker replied with a smirk.

"You are so hilarious, Riker, you should have considered another career; being a clown perhaps..." then a flash of light happened, and Riker's uniform was replaced by a very colorful …clown costume. "These new colors really suit you, don't you agree?" Q asked to Riker.

"Enough of fooling around, Q, who are those beings out there, and why did they attack us?" An exasperated Janeway asked.

"Be careful with your temper my dear, we don't want those nasty headaches to return, do we?" Q replied.

"Just answer my damn question, Q!" A frustrated Janeway said.

"But because I'm so generous I will tell you this much. They are called Vorlons, have no sense of humor whatsoever, are arrogant, seldom in their vocabulary, and as you, they hold themselves in high regard, but in reality, they are almost as low on the evolutionary ladder as you are." Q said smiling.

"That information was really helpful Q." Picard said sarcastically. "You might have just as well said nothing!

"Oh come on Jean-Luc, don't be so negative. I know that you often try to enrich your insignificant life through solving pathetic mysteries in the holodeck, so by giving you a real one I'm really doing you a favor."

"I don't need your favors or mysteries to enrich my life, you not being part of it, would be more than enough!"

"I know that you really didn't mean that Jean-Luc, so as the good friends that we are, I'm going to forgive you for that inconsiderate remark!" Q replied and put his right arm around Picard's shoulders.

"Yes, I really meant it, AND FOR THE LAST TIME, WE ARE NOT FRIENDS!" An infuriated Picard said, while shrugging Q's arm from his shoulders.

"I'm shocked, Mon capitaine, are you saying that you prefer those fake mysteries you so often indulge yourself to the real thing? I'm really disappointed with you Jean-Luc, where is your sense of adventure? Nothing beats the ambiance of a real mystery… the adrenaline rushing in your veins, the heart pounding in your chest, …that is how life must be lived, not being in that boring and glorified room. I bet that even the Vulcan agrees with me." Q said looking at Tuvok.

"I most certainly do not, the human desire of performing pleasant activities of their choosing, is by no means an indication of their will to participate in any of your games." Tuvok replied.

"You Vulcans are even more boring than the Minbari, you wouldn't recognise what pleasure is even if you were seated next to it. If your two species got together, chances are that all life in the Universe would come to an end due the combined power of so much boredom."

"Who are these Minbari? I'm not familiar with that species!" Seven asked.

"Of course you aren't! None of you has ever meet them, only the other Humans have, and now they wish they never had, since they are about to be wiped out by them." Q said.

"What humans are you talking about? I have no knowledge of any humans currently at war with another race?" Riker asked while removing the clown wig and red nose from his head.

"Are you certain that you want to know? After all, you humans also have the saying that says that the "Curiosity killed the cat!" Q taunted Riker, and after a pause continued. "You know, now that that subject comes up, I begin to realize how interesting it would be to put you and them together, the possibilities are endless!"

"What are you talking about?" Picard inquired.

"I'm talking about you, the sopping humans, full of compassion and forgiveness that can't wait to absolve almost any offense, together with the single minded, ruthless and unforgiving Minbari, yes, an encounter of you two would be a match made in heaven."

"What are you planning now Q? In what mess are you going to put us in next?" Picard asked, anxious to know what Q was planning now.

"You don't need me to get into any mess Mon Capitaine, you are in one right now, and if you had stayed where you belonged and not intrude into others affairs, none of this would have happened." Q said.

"This became our affair the moment you placed a Starfleet officer in the middle of your games!" Picard retorted.

"Hah yes her, well for your information, I really don't like her Picard, she's too opinionated for my taste, and I'm amazed the Klingons have tolerated her this much!"

"Your opinion is noted and discarded, now, what is that nonsense you are mumbling about us and those Minbari?"

"Since you are being so rude, I don't see any reasons to share my thoughts with you!" Q replied to Picard pretending to be upset.

"For why exactly did you come here again? So far all you have done was avoiding our questions and saying nothing of any use." Janeway said.

"Katie, Katie, Katie, why are you being so contemptuous? It's me, Q; can't I just drop in to chat with my two favorite Captains?" Q said.

"We both know perfectly well that you didn't come here just to chat, so cut the bullshit and tell us the real reason!" Janeway exclaimed.

"You are right my dear, in a display of generosity only worthy of someone of my stature, I came to warn you that more Vorlons are coming to see why the ships they sent previously didn't return by now, so if I were you I would leave this area immediately, they will not like having had their ships shot at." Q said.

"They fired on us first, we only defended ourselves!" Riker argued.

"Good luck trying to explain that to them, then!" Q replied.

"First you forced us to come here and be shot at, but now you are telling us to go away in order not to be shot at, I think you owe us at least an explanation!" Picard said.

"I own you nothing Picard, if you really want to boldly go where no one has gone before and bla, bla, bla, then you simply have to accept, that it's not safe out here, so stop complaining each time danger knocks at your door and hits you in the face when you open it!" Q said.

"Why the warning then? Our welfare never was something you cared for!" Janeway inquired.

"That shows how little you know me… now before I go, do you wish me to give some message to Q junior… your Godson?" Q asked Janeway.

"GODSON? Picard, Riker and Troy said in unison.

"It's a long story, I will tell you all about it later!" Janeway said to the astonished Enterprise officers, and then replied to Q. "He's only an infant, so there isn't much I can say to him, only hope that he turn out a better Q than his father."

"Ouch, that really hurt, you would be surprised with how much he grown, …I'll leave now, …my warning was delivered." Q said and then in a flash of light vanished from the briefing room.

"Captain, if Q is correct, we should leave immediately. Since the Enterprise is not yet warp capable, I suggest Voyager towing it, and we warp from here as soon as possible!" Janeway suggested.

"I agree Captain, let's make it so." Picard replied.

Minutes later Voyager moved towards the Enterprise, seized it with a tractor beam, raised its nacelles and then both ships warped away. Shortly after, a dozen vortexes appeared and from them a fleet of Vorlon dreadnoughts exited, only to face a scenario of destruction they never expected to witness.

Meantime on Centauri Prime, to Emperor Turhan, it seemed that there was no end to the bad news. And as if it wasn't enough knowing, that the fleet he had sent to meet with the Minbari had been almost destroyed by unknowns, now he was also being informed by a aide that the Minbari themselves were demanding to speak with him, and apparently were not happy.

"Here his Emperor Turhan, what can I do to help you?" Turhan asked after turning on his personal display.

**_"We just came from the gathering point and found out that your fleet had engaged in battle with unknowns, putting in danger the mission we carefully prepared, what is your explanation for this and who are they?" Satai Coplann said, _**

"Admiral Marray has just informed us of what happened, and we are as astonished as you, are. According to him, while our fleet waited for your forces to arrive, these unknowns you mentioned appeared, claiming to be looking for missing ships of theirs.

At first they did not appear to be hostile, introduced themselves as "Klingons" and claimed to come from another quadrant, whatever that is supposed to mean.

Then, without provocation, they began to attack our ships, taking them by surprise and demonstrating weapons and defense systems of great power, against which our forces could not mount a proper defense."

**_"We "request," more detailed description of these systems."_** Coplann spouted.

"They had some sort of energy fields surrounding their ships, that made them highly resistant to our weapons, powerful antimatter missiles, beam weapons that apparently had some sort of atomic disrupting properties and a perfect stealth system that not only made their ships invisible to all sensors, but as well to the naked eye!"

**_"Are you certain of all those claims? If you are deceiving us we will not take that lightly!" Coplann said. _**

"We would never do that!" The Centauri Emperor said with apprehension.

**_"Very well, send us all the information you have on them, Coplann out!"_**

After the transmission ended, Turhan immediately began felling more relieved, then pressed a switch in his throne and shortly after the aide arrived.

"Contact Admiral Murray immediately, and tell him to send at once all information he has on those Klingons that attacked him, and then resend that information to the Minbari as fast as possible!" The Emperor ordered.

"Immediately majesty!" Said the aide, which then made a bow and left an anguished Turhan alone in his throne room.

**Geneva, Earth Alliance Earth. **

Senator Clark entered his office, as usual closed the door and then tried to turn on the lights. Yet, to his surprise, some of the lights in the far side of the office remained unlit, which he quickly dismissed as a common malfunction, and went to his desk where produced a bottle of whisky from a drawer.

Before he could begin drinking from it, he noticed another presence in the room, and as he turned around to face it, a man emerged from the dark side of the room.

"Who are you? What do you want? There are guards outside!" A fearful Clark stated.

"Don't be concerned senator, I'm not here to harm you, my name is Justin and I'm here to help you."

"Help me? Help me with what?" Asked a surprised Morgan Clark.

"That is for you to decide." Said Justin.

"What do you mean?" Clark asked again.

"I'm here to help you, so I ask you again what is it that you want?" Justin re-asked.

"You must be a crazy old man, leave before I call the guards!" Clark said.

"I have very powerful friends Senator, and they have the power to help you in anything you want." Justin said with a grin.

"Why would you want to help me? What's in it for you?" Clark inquired.

Justin smiled and then said. "After helping you, we only ask that you help us back, but don't worry, it would be nothing that you couldn't do."

"You mean that I can ask for any kind of help? Clark asked.

"That is my offer!" Justin said smiling.

"Ok then, lets see if you can do this for me, bring me the head of the Klingon named Korras in a platter, and also find me a way, so that I can put my hands in their advanced technology!" Clark countered.

"Very well senator, we will see each other soon." Justin said, and then exited the room that immediately become fully lit, leaving behind a perplexed Clark immerse in his own dark thoughts.

**Location, Hyperspace. **

Riding the currents and eddies of hyperspace, the most powerful fleet the Minbari had gathered in a thousand years, was making it's way home in a very somber way. Almost as somber as it was after the battle against the cybernetic-monstrosities, after which, if the Vorlons hadn't been there to direct their flight, they certainly would have been lost due the lack of no hyperspace beacons to lock on to.

Suddenly the equally somber atmosphere in the Grey Council chambers was disrupted, by a flash of light, which upon fading away revealed a figure that all of the present resented to see again.

"Greetings fellow Council members, long time no see, and coincidently every time we meet, you have assembled a mighty fleet, isn't that strange, it's almost as if fate is trying to tell us something." Q said smiling.

At first none of the members of the grey council knew what to say or react, but then Delenn came forwards and spoke.

"You don't frighten us, the power of the light will always prevail!"

"What is it with you and all that light thing? I like light as much as the next one, but I'm not obsessed with it." Q replied.

"You cannot deceive us, we know all about you and the dark forces you command!" Delenn stated.

"No wonder the Vorlons like you, you make perfect puppets, utterly gullible and completely clueless of how much you are being manipulated, not even Worf, a Klingon that I know and who by the low standards of his specie isn't the sharpest tool in the shed, would be that naive!"

Having reached the limit of insults he could bear, Satai Morann of the Wind Swords pulled a small cylinder from under its cloak, and with a precise wrist movement activated it, making it extend many times its own length and turning it into a one and a half meter quarterstaff, also known to Minbaris as a fighting pike or denn'bok.

"Well, well, what do we have here? Are you on planning to eat and that is your oversized toothpick?" Q joked.

To Morann that joke was the last straw, and immediately attacked Q.

"THE MINBARI WILL NOT BE SCORNED ANYMORE!" Morann yelled.

Not denoting the slightest trace of fear from such formidable attack, Q simply waved its hand, and a dazzling lighting bolt immediately struck the attacking Minbari, turning him into a Gok, a Minbari equivalent of a cat.

"You really need to learn what humility is, and I'm the right teacher. The other time we met you were going to eradicate some defenseless humans and felt good about it, so now let's see what happens when you face someone not as defenceless!"

Q then snapped his fingers, and all ships appeared in normal space once again.

"Have fun now!" Q said, and then disappeared in his characteristic flash of light.

Upon seeing the familiar blackness of normal space, Coplann immediately feared the worse, namely bumping into the Borg again, and immediately called Alyt Durhan demanding a scan of the area.

A couple seconds later, having checked his console, one disbelieving Durhan replied. **_"We are in the human's home system, Satai!"_**

"Their home system? How can that be? What do you think of that?" Coplann asked to all.

"Apparently the dark being indented to punish us in some way, but either he made a mistake since the humans are not a threat to us, or the forces of light protected us from his powers." Delenn said.

"Regardless of how we came here, we should seize this unique opportunity and end what we started two years ago, …eliminate the humans for good!" Satai Kersohio said.

After a quick conference, all except the yet transformed Morann that now was being examined by healers, agreed on what course of action to take next.

"Shai Alyt Durhan, the council have decided, deploy the fleet and attack the humans!"

**_"Immediately Satai!"_** Alyt Durhan replied with a large smile of satisfaction.

Not far from there, the USS Thunderchild that was on patrol in the Sol system, also known as Sector 001, immediately detected the sudden presence of a large unidentified fleet.

"Captain, hundreds of unknown ships appeared abruptly from nowhere, …they are coming this way and bringing their weapons hot!" The tactical officer said alarmed.

"GO TO RED ALERT, inform Starfleet Command that we may be under attack by a large unknown fleet, raise shields, load all torpedo bays and ready phasers!" Captain Evelyn Hoffman ordered.

TBC


	13. Revelations

**Chapter 13**

**On board the IKS Kahless.**

"Please don't interpret wrong what I'm about to say, but although understanding the reason of your anger towards them, to simply leave could prove to be a miscalculation, imagine that later it turns out that they had information that we would have needed or then that…"

ENOUGH!" Korras interrupted Shelby's reasoning; the Klingon was so pissed off due to petty Humans having doubted of the wisdom of his plan, that any argument that was contrary to his decision of cutting all the ties with the EA only served to enrage him more. "Not even you, the Federation Humans, would be that ungrateful towards those trying to help you. My decision is final. If we must, we will have to obtain information from elsewhere!" Korras said with an extremely harsh tone of voice.

Not wishing to further increase the anger of an already very exasperated Klingon, Shelby promptly acquiescented and decided to drop the issue. "As you wish Brigadier, but then I really suggest that we begin looking for information elsewhere. That is if we want to have any hope in discovering what exactly Q is machinating."

"I fail to see why you believe that someone out there, may have any information that could help us find out what Q wants of us. But since you do, I'm curious…what kind of information you think that we should look for?" Korras inquired.

"At the very top of my list would be determine, whom the organic ships that attacked us belong to, and why they did what they did. With the EA as a source of information out of the picture, and the data that we gained from both Brakiri and Minbari data banks not shedding any light on that matter, getting information elsewhere is the only option left." Shelby tried to clarify her point of view.

"And why is that it would be so important to determine that?" Korras asked, Himself having no idea why Shelby believed that was so important discover who the aliens were, unless it was to and punish them for having dared to attack the mighty Klingon Empire.

"Q forced us to come here, Brigadier, and those beings apparently attacked us because didn't want us here. Their message stated that they believe that our coming will disturb something they called, "the circle", so I would be surprised if the two things were not related." Shelby explained.

"And why didn't you mention this theory of yours before?" Korras roared. "We wasted precious time on these Alliance Earthers, when we could have been searching for those organic vessels."

"Before, we both had agreed to pursue a different path, a path which to me still seems to be more appropriate. What I mentioned now is only an alternative; that while not as appealing, is the only thing left that presently I can think of. If you have a better idea, I'm all ears" Shelby retorted.

Korras didn't appreciate at all the somewhat aggressive answer that Shelby gave, even if he was somewhat impressed by her nerve. But deep down he realized she was right, so he let it pass and asked another question. "So any ideas were we should go get that information about the aliens?"

"As I said before, considering present circumstances, the best course of action that I can think of, is we try to get that information from other races of this quadrant.

The Centauri, the Narn, or even the League of Nonaligned Worlds to whom the Brakiri belong to, seems good candidates. Maybe with them we'll have more luck than we had so far." Shelby said.

"Not bad, Cmdr, but the main problem is that we don't have the resources to implement it. As you should remember, Q said that we were not going to have much time, and trying to contact all those races with the few ships that we have, would take too long!" Korras exclaimed.

"I'm aware of that, Brigadier, but on my part, I cannot discern any other viable option. Do you have other ideas?" Shelby asked.

"Instead spreading all our ships to the four corners of the quadrant, let's try out nearest sources first." Korras said with a grin.

"What sources?" Shelby asked with genuine interest, since she knew that all the data that they had gathered so far wouldn't reveal any more than had done already, and the EA certainly would not help, unless Korras changed his attitude and helped them back.

"The prisoners of course!" Korras said to Shelby, as if that was the most natural thing in the Universe.

"The prisoners? But so far they have shown to have a remarkable physical and mental resistance, not even Lieutenant Gorrod's "most vigorous" interrogation techniques were enough to force them to talk, why would be different now?

"Then it's time to use more effective procedures, and if that means that we have to empty their minds and converting them into vegetables, so be it!" Korras snorted.

"Sir, is that …really necessary? Given the lack of knowledge that we have of Minbari physiology, the Mind-sifter may not be most suitable thing to use" Shelby said.

"Are you questioning my command decisions Cmdr?" Korras asked menacingly.

"No Sir, ...of course not." Shelby replied, acquiescently.

"Good, it would be a shame if I had to inform Starfleet, that you died…immediately after having defied me…dismissed Cmdr." Korras roared.

Hours later, on the bridge of the IKS Kahless, a Cmdr Shelby, seated in the command chair, heard the intercom coming to life.

"_**Commander, …notify all captains that they are to come aboard for a council of battle, Korras out."**_

"Yes Brigadier, I will transmit the order immediately!" Shelby replied. "Lieutenant k'nera, inform Captains, Kreen, Marlok and K'temoc that they are to come aboard to attend a council of battle."

Without delay, the communications officer of the Kahless acknowledged the order, and immediately transmitted it.

Not surprisingly, it didn't take long for the captains to recognize the order and beam aboard the Kahless.

**Battle Council chambers.**

"I ordered you all to come here because after analyzing thoroughly our situation, I concluded that a different strategy is in order. First: we will begin by departing from here, these humans have shown to be unworthy of our aid, so they do not deserve that we spill our blood for them. "

Immediately the captains began to express their satisfaction, and all had one thing in common - satisfaction for Korras decision.

"SILENCE!" Korras shouted. "Second: In order to resolve our current dilemma, our new priority will be to find out who are the aliens that attacked us, and why they did it. I believe that their actions towards us are somehow related with the Q being, and his damned test."

"How did you reach that conclusion Brigadier?" Captain Kreen asked.

Korras answered, by activating a holographic display in the middle of the table. Then the image of the organic ships appeared, followed by the message that they had sent prior to the attack. _**"Go back." "The circle must not be broken, go back or you will be Destroyed."**_

"After having listened to this more carefully, I became convinced that their attack was not as senseless as we initially thought. Their words although few show that had a purpose. Apparently they consider that our presence will disturb something that they value. And since our presence is related with Q, the connection is obvious. Therefore we must find out who they are, and what it is that they don't want disturbed, then I believe that everything will become clear." Korras stated.

"And how will we do that, Sir?" K'temoc asked.

Korras pressed a button in the in a panel in front of him, and another Klingon entered in the room.

"Lieutenant, …tell us your findings." Korras commanded.

Lieutenant Gorrod, the ship's Chief of Security made a step forward and started his report.

"At first the captured Minbari when facing physical interrogation, proved to be very sturdy and resilient, clearly preferring death to betray their own kind. So due to that, the Brigadier decided that other procedures were in order and that the Mind-sifter should be used. At first the prisoners continue showing a great resistance, but after reaching level five their…"

"Spare me the details and get to the point!" Korras demanded, interrupting Gorrod's explanation of how he had managed to defeat the prisoner's remarkable willpower.

"They consider themselves very honorable, the oldest of what they call the "young races" in this quadrant, and predestined to be their leaders. It seems that many millennia ago this area of space was inhabited by very powerful and advanced "older races". They refer these beings as "First Ones" but their bulk is believed to have left the galaxy, the only known exception is a race they call Vorlons.

These Vorlons are very reclusive and anyone who attempted to contact them by entering their space, disappeared and never was seen again."

"And that information is relevant, just how exactly?" An impatient K'temoc asked.

"The Vorlons use living ships!" Tanang replied.

"Are you telling us that these… "Vorlons"… are the ones who attacked us?" Marlok asked.

"All present evidence points to that, Captain." Gorrod replied.

"What do you intend to do, Brigadier?" Kreen asked.

To which Korras immediately replied. "Given that we now know who attacked us, normally we would send a punitive expedition and make them pay. But unfortunately we don't have enough ships to successfully wage a war. But as they seem to be the key to solving our problem with Q, …this is what I propose…"

In orbit of Earth, the EAS Heracles, a Nova Class Dreadnought was waiting for the arrival of its new captain, to begin a mission that could well mean Earth's salvation.

"Here is shuttle six seven four, we are bringing Captain John Sheridan, requesting permission to dock." The pilot said.

"_**You are cleared to dock."**_ The Heracles controller replied.

Minutes later the shuttle docked safely, and his new first officer, one Commander Elizabeth Lochley, welcomed the new arrived captain.

"Hello John, congratulations for the promotion." Lochley said.

Sheridan was caught completely off guard by her presence.

"Elizabeth, certainly it's a surprise see you here." Sheridan barely was able to say.

"I hope that you don't think that it's problem, me being your First Officer?"

"Of course not, I'm just surprised, that's all."

With a crewmember taking Sheridan's personal belongings to his quarters, the two senior officers made their way to the habitable area of the ship, then to the bridge to officially hand over the command of the ship.

"Attention all hands, Captain on the bridge. Welcome to the bridge Captain, you have the command." Lochley said.

"Thank you Commander." Sheridan replied, and then continued. "What is our status?"

"A complete chaos Sir, the technical personnel is still working non stop to install the new equipment. They were given only a few days, to do work that normally would take weeks to complete." Lochley informed.

"That is not the worse part Commander, Earth Force Command wants that we leave immediately." Sheridan stated.

"WHAT? That is madness, neither the extra generators, the Minbari communication array nor the sensors are fully installed, much less operational." An appalled Lochley complained.

"Then we will have to get the damned things installed and into working order while en route." Sheridan said.

"That is insane, we do not have enough crewmembers to simultaneously run the ship and install the equipment." Lochley replied.

"Of course we don't, that is why we are taking with us as many technicians as possible." Sheridan said.

"And how many technicians are as many as possible? Currently there are thousands of them running around, and even with that many, they will be hard pressed to install all the stuff in a week. And we definitely cannot take that many extra people aboard!" Lochley exclaimed.

"Yes we can, we just have to be creative." Sheridan replied.

"I cannot wait to see how creative you can be, Captain." Lochley said sarcastically.

"As we speak shipping orders are being emitted and bunks are going to be installed in wherever there is space. We are to departure as soon as possible. There will not be time to goodbyes or to get personal belongings; extra supplies, uniforms and standard clothing for all are on the way, we are working against the clock here. The Minbari may attack at any moment, so every second counts." Sheridan said, trying to convey to all in the bridge, the urgency of their situation.

"In those conditions the ship will be almost ungovernable, systems turned off so that others could be connected, technicians and crewmembers getting in the way of each other, not to mention the stress that so many people stacked on top of each other will create." Lochley replied.

"Stress will be the least of everyone concerns if we can't find an ally by the time the Minbari attack." Sheridan countered.

"And in this conditions how will we be able to enter in battle if a combat situation occurs, Sir!" Lochley said.

"We will not enter in any battle Commander, our mission is paramount, and in no circumstances we will risk it by going into a battle, no matter the situation." Sheridan explained.

"What is our mission exactly?" Lochley asked.

"I will brief you as soon we enter hyperspace." Sheridan said.

Several hours later the EAS Heracles started its engines, broke from orbit and headed to open space, where shortly after it opened a jump point and disappeared into the vastness of hyperspace.

**EAS Heracles Bridge.**

"Ok it's time to put all the cards on the table. As you all know, several days ago a race never seen before contacted us and shown their willingness to help us fight the Minbari. They call themselves "Klingons", and have even gone as far as facing three Minbari warships that undoubtedly were scanning our defenses in preparation for their attack.

As you all know, the Klingons won that battle and didn't even lose a single ship in the process. That by itself was an amazing feat, as the Minbari, up until that moment, used to be the most powerful of all known races.

It seemed that our prayers for help had been answered, but unfortunately a day ago, everything went downhill. The Klingon leader felt insulted by one of our Generals and apparently decided to withdraw their offer of assistance." Sheridan said.

"Who was it?" Lochley asked.

"Who was what?" Sheridan asked

"Who offended the Klingon leader?

"It was General Martel." Sheridan replied, and rolled his eyes.

"Great, first it was Jankowski that screw us, and now was Martel, what a bunch of fucking morons we have in command!" A bridge officer said in an outburst.

Sheridan gave him a very admonitory look, but didn't disagree with him very much.

"As I was saying, they apparently decided to withdraw their assistance, and until our departure they have ignored all of our attempts to apologize and reestablish lines of communication with them.

As many of you also may know, with them came a Human that belongs to a large interstellar government called the "United Federation of Planets", that is stated to span over eight thousand light years.

They are as advanced as the Klingons, and thus it was decided to try to make contact with them. The Klingons originally come from the other side of the galaxy, and arrived here trough a wormhole.

Our objective is to locate this wormhole, and try to make contact with this Human Federation, with the obvious intent of asking for help.

I know that all this is a very long shot, but it's all that we have. Hopefully, with the more advanced Minbari sensors and comm. array, we will succeed in our endeavor. Does anyone have any questions?" Sheridan asked.

"Even with Minbari sensors, we're looking for a needle in a haystack, do we even know the approximate location of the wormhole?" Lochley asked.

"It is believed to be located in the Tigris sector, now I do know that that is very vague, but it's all that we got, and we must hope it is enough. We will arrive there in two days, so you see how important is that by then we have all systems running." Sheridan replied.

Meanwhile, above the EA Earth, another ship broke orbit, it was the EAS Cerberus. As the Heracles, also it was a Nova Class Dreadnought.

**IKS Kahless Bridge.**

"What do you think of that Cmdr? Only minutes ago the ship refitted with Minbari technology departed, now another ship is also doing it. Would they be deserting? After seeing how unworthy they are, I wouldn't put it past them." Korras snorted with contempt.

"Brigadier, I'm detecting communications, and contrary to the previous vessel, that one is being ordered to return to orbit, but they are ignoring the hails." K'nera informed.

"You see Cmdr, I was right, they are cowards and are running from battle, are trying to save their worthless lives, leaving their own kind to be slaughtered as Targs in a slaughterhouse, Korras replied with the satisfaction of being right.

Meanwhile some other Earth Force ships had start firing on the fleeing Dreadnought.

**IKS Kahless Bridge.**

"I still think that there is more to that than meets the eye, in the two years that they have fought the Minbari, never a single ship of theirs fled from duty. So why now, immediately after the departure of the ship with Minbari equipment?" Shelby asked, but to no one in particular.

"Maybe they had, but did not have the courage to admit it." Korras replied.

"Maybe…" Shelby replied.

"Whatever their fate, it's no longer of concern to us, it's time for us to leave as well." Korras said.

Seconds later, all Klingon ships left orbit at full impulse, and not even bother to look back, therefore not only not witnessing the successful escape of the rogue EA vessel into the safety of hyperspace, but also failing to detect the presence of a dark and spiky silhouette that was watching them, silhouette that then shimmered and faded away as if it was a ghost.

TBC


	14. When worlds collide part I

**Chapter 14**

It was a magnificent summer day in the City of San Francisco; in fact everything in that day seemed so marvelous, that undoubtedly many people considered the perfect example of a perfect day. But suddenly, all that perfection came to a crashing end when from the Starfleet Command Center complex; Klaxons began howling unmistakable sounds.

"What's happening?" Captain N'bura Ashanti, currently the senior officer on duty, in the command center demanded.

"Its the automated planetary warning system, Captain, it just came online." A Starfleet officer responded.

"I know what it is you fool! What I want to know is why it came online! Ashanti spouted annoyed with the answer.

"Checking now, Captain…Oh my God… this cannot be right!" The perplexed officer exclaimed.

"What is it?" Ashanti asked.

"Sensors just picked up many thousands of unidentified contacts, and are at less than seventy two million kilometers from us." A distressed Starfleet officer said.

"Let me see that." Ashanti said, and quickly headed towards the officer's monitor to check for herself.

"You see? There they are! The officer replied to Ashanti pointing to a small screen that was packed with little white dots.

"This doesn't make any sense… thousands of ships cannot appear from thin air.

"They must have come cloaked… it's the only explanation." The officer replied.

Ashanti now had retuned to her position and was trying to get more information on the new arrivals, but apparently the sensors were not being very cooperative.

"I'm having difficulty in scanning them. What's wrong with the sensors?" The Starfleet captain asked.

"All sensors are functioning within normal parameters, Captain, our scans are is being jammed. I'm going to try to compensate the drift of the signal by using a wider theta band frequency." The officer said.

"Captain, The USS Thunderchild is transmitting a code-one distress signal!" Another Starfleet officer informed.

"On screen!" Ashanti ordered.

Immediately Evelyn Hoffman the captain of the USS Thunderchild appeared on the command center main viewscreen. Her concerned look immediately cleared any doubts that Ashanti could have about the seriousness of the current situation.

"**This is Captain Evelyn Hoffman of the USS Thunderchild, an immense unknown fleet just appeared from nowhere.****We have been trying to establish contact with them, but so far all our attempts have been unsuccessful.  
That fleet consists of hundreds of capital warships and thousands of small fighters; it's my belief that that fleet is definitely hostile."**

"Don't you think that it's too earlier to draw such a conclusion, Captain? This situation may have a reasonable explanation!" A still nervous captain Ashanti answered.

"**Are you serious? Without the slightest warning, thousands of heavily armed vessels just appeared in the heart of the Federation territory, and you still want to give them the benefit of the doubt? Wake up, Captain; those vessels carry so many weapons that hardly can serve any other purpose than to wage war. I have been in enough battles to be able to recognize danger when I see it, and this certainly qualifies as such." **Hoffman replied harshly, not so subtly pointing out the other officer's lack of field experience.

"A decision of that importance cannot be made that frivolously and solely based on your past exploits, Captain. I urge you to not act foolishly or to adopt a posture that could be interpreted as hostile, the last thing that we need right now is another war." Ashanti advised Hoffman.

**USS Thunderchild**

Captain Hoffman almost couldn't believe what she had heard. "ME TREATING THIS SITUATION FRIVOUSLY? Is she insane? How the hell can anyone not consider that as a imminent threat!" Hoffman gesture to her ship's main viewer that now displayed so many blue vessels, that the darkness of space behind them was almost hidden. "If she thinks that I'm going to sit here with my guard down and waiting be blown to bits, she's sorely mistaken… helm, bring us to an interception course… and continue transmitting those hailings."

**Starfleet Command Center.**

"CONTACT THE ADMIRALTY IMMEDIATELY!" Ashanti shouted to a nearby officer.

"Yes Captain, right away!" The officer replied.

Seconds later Admiral Owen Paris appeared in the main viewscreen. **"What's happening? Why the alarm?"**

"A massive unknown fleet was just detected at less than seventy two million kilometers from Earth, Admiral. The only explanation for them having managed to get this close undetected is they have come cloaked.

The USS Thunderchild is currently the closest ship to them; its captain has informed us that already tried to establish contact with them, but so far did not receive any reply.

She believes that this fleet may present a serious threat, …but I believe that is too early to reach that conclusion.

"**I would call seventy-two million kilometers close enough for a surprise attack, Captain. At maximum impulse that force can easily reach us in less than five minutes.**

If they really wanted to attack and get us off guard, why not reveal themselves in only the last moment." Ashanti tried to explain her point of view.

"**Your considerations are duly noted… now go to Red alert immediately and activate all the planetary defenses, Paris out."** The Admiral harshly beamed.

"You heard the order, go to RED ALERT, activate all planetary defenses, and broadcast a wide-band code-one priority alert." Ashanti ordered.

All around the Solar system as the alert was received, all kinds of ships, runabouts and shuttles, immediately discarded whatever task were doing and began converging on Earth.

In Earth orbit, the immense Space-dock, after launching all combat worthy vessels, initiated an emergency lockdown, and for the first time since the Breen attack, activated its shields, and energized all its 350 phasers arrays and 30 torpedo launchers.

In other places, mostly around Earth and Mars orbit, many ships in many degrees of readiness began exiting dry-docks, to help in the upcoming battle. Some of them didn't even have full hull plating; others only had partially operational weapons or shields. One ship, the USS Monarch, a Nebula Class cruiser only had one operational nacelle as the other had been partially disassembled for repairs, but yet now was running at full impulse towards to an apparently unavoidable battle.

Its captain, William Kirk, descendant of Samuel Kirk, brother of the legendary James T. Kirk, had been absolutely adamant in that his ship was going to participate in Earth's defense no matter what. And upon the refusal of the dry-dock officer on duty to allow his ship leave by claiming that it wasn't minimally ready to fight, Kirk threatened to shoot his way out of the dry-dock. So the officer didn't have any other choice but releasing the mooring clamps that were holding the starship.

On orbit of both Earth and the Moon, with the exception of the myriad of ships that were responding to the alert, all activity had ceased, all non-combatant vessels had docked, landed or were heading away from Earth attempting to reach safety.

Also unfortunately for Earth, the Moon presently was on the opposite side of the approaching unknown fleet. So unless the Moon also was attacked, its defense system weren't going to be of much use.

Aboard the vessel that was going to be Flag Ship of the Federation defense forces, the USS Galaxy, Admiral Owen Paris, seated in the captain's chair began issuing orders. "Attention all vessels, this is Admiral Paris aboard the USS Galaxy; a massive unknown fleet his coming towards Earth. So far they have ignored all our hails, therefore are to be considered hostile until orders of the contrary. Starfleet Command is relaying coordinates to where the defense fleet is to gather, Godspeed to all."

"How many ships have reported so far? And what's the status of the planetary defenses?" Paris questioned the tactical officer.

"So far have reported as ready and taking defense positions, thirty-nine starships, five-hundred and forty three runabouts and sixty two hundred shuttles, but all around Sol many more vessel are reporting and en route. All planetary defenses are ready Admiral!" The tactical officer informed.

Meanwhile in the Minbari command ship, Durhan was awfully confused. "What is going on? This readings do not make any sense, where are the humans' ships, and what vessels are those?"

"They resemble Vree vessels Shai Alyt, could it be that the Vree are going to side with the humans and fight against us?" The First officer asked.

"If they are, then they will face the same fate as the humans." An angered Durhan spouted.

"Shai Alyt, our fighters have almost reached their most forward ship." Another Minbari said.

"Tell them that when ready, they can fire at will!" Durhan ordered.

"Yes Shai Alyt." The Minbari said submissively.

In the chambers of the Grey Council, eight hooded figures were observing everything through a holographic display; some were confused with what were seeing, but for now all remained calm and certain of the outcome of the battle.

**On board the USS Thunderchild. **

"It's of no use Captain, they are not responding to any of the hails, and I've tried all the frequencies, hell I don't even detect any subspace receivers on them." The operations officer said.

"The fighters are closing in Captain, five hundred kilometers, four hundred, three hundred, two hundred, they are firing!" the tactical officer exclaimed.

Next, dozens and dozens of energy beams simultaneously began hitting the Federation starship making its shields flare intensely.

**On board the USS Thunderchild.**

"I guess this clears all our doubts about their intentions. Let's see if they also like being hit. All phasers, fire at will." Hoffman ordered.

Immediately and in an amazingly rapid succession, beams of energy emanating from arrays covering the Federation starship's hull began shooting down the many fighters zipping around.

"Damage report!" Captain Hoffman ordered.

"So far none of consequence, Captain. They are firing some sort of coherent neutron beams. Presently there are twenty-two vessels firing at us, the shields are holding firmly but their numbers continue to rise fast." The tactical officer informed.

The attacking Minbari pilots were utterly shocked with what had happened, not only the alien vessel had survived an attack that would have destroyed even the most powerful Minbari warship, as it seemed to have stayed completely unscathed. Obviously those aliens that had chosen to help the humans were a serious threat, but Minbari do not fear a good battle, so all-irrelevant thoughts were put aside and with a redoubled willingness they increased the ferocity of their attack.

The Thunderchild on its turn continued shooting down the pesky fighters surrounding it. But inexorably, its defenses began to buckle.

**On board the USS Thunderchild**

"Our shields are beginning to fail, captain. Their weapons are not very powerful, but what they lack in power compensate with numbers. Now there are ninety fighters firing at us and several even rammed us, and I'm not certain it were accidental rams. Their numbers still continue to increase." The tactical officer said as enemy fire was heard hitting the hull and making the starship rock.

"What's the distance to their first line of capital ships?" Hoffman asked.

"Twenty thousand kilometers!" The tactical officer exclaimed.

"Fire all forward torpedo bays!" Hoffman commanded as sparks and smoke began filling the bridge.

"I need a few more seconds Captain, their capital ships are generating a lot of interferences." The tactical officer said as a console not far from him exploded sending a crewmember to the ground.

"Now would be a good time Mr. Berik." Hoffman said to the Andorian tactical officer.

"Almost done Captain, …one more second, … I got it, firing now." Berik said.

Immediately four fast bright orbs of light exit from the torpedo launcher in the rollbar and three more from the underside of the saucer section.

"Began evasive maneuver Ypsilon Kirk, and go to full impulse, NOW!" Hoffman commanded. A second later the Thunderchild began to roll to port and accelerating at a speed that the Minbari fighters could not cope with, soon getting out of harm's way.

Now seven bright orbs of light were heading towards the large Minbari warships. Several Nial pilots sensing that whatever that those orbs of light were it were not good things, began firing on them, but the effect was none.

One of the pilots, so eager it was to destroy one of the glowing projectiles, that got too close and in a miscalculated maneuver collided with it being reduced to atoms.

After seeing that, all ships in the front lines realized of the danger and opened fire with everything it had, unfortunately it was too late and the projectiles began hitting its targets with impressive results. A powerful Sharlin was hit by two torpedoes and was almost teared in half; a Tinashi frigate was lucky and only lost a lower fin. On other places, depending on where the Minbari ships were hit, the damaged vary, but all had one thing in common, very large peaces of their crystalline armor were seen flying.

"Our ships are being hit and are reporting heavy damages; our stealth doesn't seem to be effecting them." The Fist officer informed his Alyt.

Durhan was almost speechless, and only with some difficulty was able to articulate is next order. "All ships are to widen the formation, and as soon they are in weapons range, fire everything, do not hold back."

**Federation command ship.**

"Admiral, they began firing on the Thunderchild!" The USS Galaxy tactical officer informed Admiral Paris.

"Its official then, we have another war in our hands, but who the hell are they?" Admiral Paris inquired himself.

"Their design isn't even remotely similar with anything that we have in our databanks, Sir." The tactical officer replied thinking that the Admiral was making a question.

"Open wide fleet communications." Paris ordered.

"Communications open, Sir." The operations officer said.

"This is Admiral Paris, one of our ships was just fired upon, …We are now officially at war, everyone is clear to fire at will, initiate attack pattern omega one three seven."

Immediately after the order, all Federation vessels began firing and getting to positions.

**Minbari command ship.**

"Shai Alyt… all the saucer ships and their fighters have began firing on us, but their beam weapons and particularly their glowing missiles are nothing like the Vree's ever showed have before. All over the fleet, reports of heavy damages are being emitted." A Minbari said.

"I don't care what their weapons look like, fire back… destroy them, kill them all!" An enraged Durhan demanded.

"We can't, Alyt, we are still out of weapons range for the next twenty seconds!" The first officer informed.

"Order the fleet to go to maximum speed, fire all weapons as soon as possible, I want them all reduced to dust! Durhan spouted.

Without delay, all Minbari ships began increasing their speeds, and seconds later; both fleets were locked in a deadly battle and firing on each other.

The fire from both fleets was so thick that almost was possible to walk on it. Minbari Nial fighters, and Federation Runabouts and shuttles, had been the first ones to engage in battle. The Nials greatly outnumbered the Federation small vessels, but what these lack in numbers, it had in resistance, speed and firepower.

Each Nial that was hit, was immediately destroyed and although that didn't happened with Federation ships, they were been hit by so many beams simultaneously and in very short intervals, that its shields were not able to resist for long.

**Minbari command ship.**

"Shai Alyt, although our fighters outnumber the enemy ones' immensely, we are losing them at an alarming rate." Durhan's first officer said.

"It shouldn't take long to eradicate their main vessels; they and those damned glowing missiles are the main threat, after we eliminate them, we will come back and help the fighters." Durhan said.

Now also the numerous classes of Federation starships and Minbari vessels were fighting at close quarters, and as had happened before with the smaller vessels, the Federation capital ships greatly outmaneuvered and outlast its Minbari counterparts, but the numerical difference was immense.

**Federation command ship.**

"Admiral, at this present rate, we are not going to be able to hold them for long. We are outnumbered by a factor of fifty-to-one. We already lost nine starships and hundreds of runabouts and shuttles… we need reinforcements and fast." Captain Ridick, presently serving as first officer said to Admiral Paris.

"I fully agree Captain, if want to survive until more reinforcements arrive a new strategy is in order. …This is Admiral Paris to the fleet; beta group Initiate a beta six attack pattern, alpha group follow me, we will flank them on the right."

"Sir, that way we are going to create a clear path for the enemy to reach Earth." An appalled captain Ridick said.

"As you have said Captain, with our current forces we will not be able to hold this defense line for long. We need to add Earth's defense forces to ours and even the numbers more."

"But Admiral, if they manage to bypass Earth's defenses, nothing else will stood between them and Earth, millions may die! Ridick exclaimed.

"If we try to maintain fixed positions, the fleet certainly will be destroyed, we need to keep moving and use our vessels superior maneuverability and speed to our advantage. Having both Earth's defenses and the fleet fighting simultaneously, is our best chance to survive." Paris said.

**Minbari command ship.**

"Shai Alyt, we passed their defenses, we have now a clear path to the humans Homeworld." A pleased Minbari point it out.

"Good, let's proceed and eliminate for good the scourge that the human race is. Have our rear forces to deal with the enemy ships." Durhan said with conviction.

Shai Alyt, shouldn't be better to assure first the total destruction of the enemy fleet, and only then attack their Homeworld?" The first officer asked.

"They are beaten, I will not waste more time with leftovers." Durhan replied.

"Alyt, we are having unaccepted loses, we are losing the absurd amount of almost thirty, vessels for every one of their ships, having fewer ship fighting their remaining forces will only serve to accentuate our loses." The first officer said.

"Enough, I have decided, this battle with the humans already last too long, I will not drag it for more time just to spare a few ships. This is going to end now. Is that clear or I have to have you removed from the bridge?" A pissed Durhan asked.

"No Shai Alyt that will not be necessary." The first officer replied.

Meantime the fierce battle was continuing and growing in intensity in each second that passed.

A Miranda vessel, the USS Onyx was in a particular dire situation as it was surrounded by five Minbari war-cruisers that continuously were firing on it. Its hull was already terribly scorched, clearly indicating that its deflector shields were no longer offering much protection.

Yet the troubled vessel lined its bow with one Minbari cruiser and fired a volley of two torpedoes that completely obliterated its target, but that was its last action. A powerful neutron beam finally passed through the Onyx's shields and cut its starboard nacelle in half, sending it in an uncontrolled spin. The remaining four war-cruisers immediately closed in for the kill.

But before that could happen, another Federation ship that had came all the way from Mars; dropped out of warp and fired a single Quantum torpedo that completely destroyed the closest war-cruiser. The remaining three Minbari vessels immediately began focusing their attentions on the new threat.

And with confidence that their numerical superiority would allow them a swift victory, they began attacking the new ship. But to their utter surprise, the new vessel divided itself in three parts and with a deadly rain of fire from each part; quickly destroyed all three Minbari war-cruisers.

With which new second, more Federation ships were arriving at the battle scene, and adding more destruction to the Minbari forces, but the Federation forces continue having loses, and the situation was becoming grim.

By now almost half of the Minbari fighters had been destroyed, but the Federation also had paid a terrible price, mainly in Runabouts and Shuttles.

In the middle of the immense battle, another Federation starship had just been destroyed, barely having managed to launch a few escape pods. The Minbari War-cruiser that had caused the Federation's vessel destruction now had begun shooting down the defenseless pods, one after the other. To the survivors of the last remaining pod, the brief relief that they had felt after successfully having escaped their ship's destruction, was now replaced with pure terror. But before theirs deaths could occur, a one hundred years old Federation Starship, the USS Bozeman intervened and tractored the pod to safety while firing its two phaser cannons repeatedly and completely destroying Minbari attacking vessel.

**Minbari command ship.**

Shai Aly, our main force almost reached the humans' Homeworld." The first officer informed.

"Begin the attack as soon as possible!" Durhan ordered.

Now a force o eight Sharlins and two Tinashis were closing on the massive Space-dock station, and every Minbari captain was eager to be the first one to open fire on the massive structure and be the one to claim the honor of having it destroyed, but unfortunately for them, that honor never came.

From the said station, a deadly rain of beams fell on them, and before any Minbari could express a single thought; their existence ended. Simultaneously to that attack, sixty torpedoes and almost a hundred phaser beams had been launched against the Minbari main force, causing dead by the dozens in each second.

After seeing that, Durhan's jaw widenin disbelieve, now he realized why his ships had passed so easily through the forces that were helping the humans. But he had learned his lesson and wasn't going to be deceived again. Immediately and by Durhan's order, a force of fifty war-ships headed towards the cursed station while the rest of the main fleet proceeded towards the Humans' planet to accomplish their sacred mission.

TBC


	15. When worlds collide part II

**Chapter 15**

As the Minbari attack force got closer and closer to their target, Alyt Shakat asked to his first officer. "How much longer until we have them in weapons range?"

"Fifty two more seconds Alyt." The first officer replied.

"That all ships increase speed then… for each second that those aliens live, an additional insult to the souls of all the brave warriors that so far have fallen in battle is being made." A very enraged Alyt uttered.

Immediately the order was carried out, but before the distance from where their weapons could be brought to bear was reached, numerous explosions began plaguing the approaching force.

Alyt, Alyt, we are being fired upon ... it's the alien station, and at the rate that our vessels are being destroyed, before we can get in range to fire a single shot none will be left." A young distressed Minbari voiced from across the bridge, his emotional state certainly related of what he saw that had happened when of the earlier attack on the same target.

But besides the information be unnecessary as the holographic display in the bridge was showing the aforementioned events, the remark didn't sit well with Shakat that immediately made clear what his thoughts on the matter were. "A true Warrior does not fear death as he is already dead, only those of the living can fear."

"Please forgive me Alyt, I have spoken hastingly." Stated a humiliated Minbari as all eyes on the bridge accusatorily fell upon him.

Against such reasoning no arguments could stand; now Shakak was pretty confident that no one else would dare make further commentaries, especially ones that could be perceived as not very warrior like. However despite all his rhetoric Shakat knew that the present situation wasn't sustainable and that a different tactic had to be implemented and quickly.

"Order the Valir and the Hentur to go to hyperspace. Then once they get there transmit them the station coordinates. No matter how powerful that battlestation is, nothing can survive the power of a jump point." Shakat spouted.

Swiftly, two Sharlins veered away from the fast diminishing attack force and through a suddenly appeared swirling blue vortex, quickly disappeared.

In the command center of Earth's Spacedock, the event hadn't passed unnoticed.

**Earth's ****Spacedock**

"What the hell… did you saw that? Where did those ships go?" An astonished Federation officer never having seen anything like that inquired.

"I don't know, but I have the feeling that we may not like the answer to that." Another officer replied.

**Hyperspace**

Now successfully having reached the safety of Hyperspace, the two Minbari vessels began waiting for the transmission that would bring the coordinates of where the exit jump points should be created.

"The coordinates have arrived Alyt." A Minbari spoke.

"Excellent, get us in position quickly." The Alyt ordered.

But as the navigator tried to determine their current hyperspace position so that the order could be accurately executed; the worst that could happen to any ship in hyperspace occurred.

In a tone of urgency the navigator immediately addressed his Alyt. "All the navigational beacons seem to have disappeared, we need to exit to normal space at once before we drift too deep and become permanently lost."

"WHAT, are you certain?" An astonished Alyt asked.

"Absolutely Alyt, I have checked several times and there is no doubt." The navigator replied.

"Alyt, the Hentur have reported also that no navigational beacons are being detected." Another Minbari voiced.

"Could it be that the humans have destroyed all the nav beacons in the area just to prevent our coming? They are truly an insane race that doesn't regard whom they harm. They deserve nothing more than total annihilation. Let us exit immediately while we still can." The Alyt angrily stated.

Immediately in normal space where a brutal battle was still raging, a small rupture in the fabric of space appeared and began to increase in size until it fully manifested as an energy vortex from where two large blue vessels exit.

The Minbari plan to destroy the alien station with a jump point attack hadn't work as planed, but surprisingly they had exit at only a few kilometers from the enemy.

To the Alyts of the Hentur and the Valir this meant that with a small modification the original plan was still salvageable, so both like if had read each other mind immediately ordered that jump points were opened on the enemy.

**Earth's Spacedock**

"Captain, Captain, two alien vessels just exit from a wormhole like the one of where the two of the approaching fleet had entered."

"What, then fire on them NOW." The station Captain yelled.

Immediately the tactical officer redirected several phaser arrays towards the new threat, but before a single shot could be fired, the reaping forces of a newly formed jump point touched the mushroom shaped station causing unbelievable destruction.

Yet regardless of its powerful shielding, in less ten a second, a quarter of the space station dome disappeared in shocking explosion. Throughout the entire station, thousands of lights that before were fully lighted began to flicker and completely faded away.

Without wasting time the two Minbari warships immediately began unleashing all their might on the now defenseless station.

Shakat that so far had had a very stern frown, now allowed himself to have a brief smile, the jump point attack had worked. And now that his attack force had reached weapons range without wasting time their firepower was added to the ones of the Hentur and Valir. Unfortunately for him, in his eagerness in destroy the station momentarily forgotten that a large battle was still occurring and many enemy vessels were running around.

The USS Monarch was one of those vessels. It had just arrived at the battlefield when through the main viewscreen the crew witnessed the dreadful scene.

"My God, tens of thousands must have died instantaneously!" The first officer exclaimed.

"Mr. Garrack, plot an interception course to those ships, all weapons ready to fire on my command." Kirk ordered.

"Sir, are you planning to engage all those ships alone? The phasers are still offline and only the torpedo bays one and two have torpedoes, seven in total." The tactical officer stated.

"Thanks for that useful information Lieutenant." Kirk replied bluntly. "Many thousands aboard that station may still be alive; I will not stand here doing nothing while they are being butchered, initiate attack pattern delta six, now." Kirk ordered.

Swiftly, the Federation starship closed on the Minbari attackers and from its rollbar several glowing projectiles departed, seconds later the targets were hit with deadly results.

"Alyt, we are being attacked from the rear, it's a single enemy vessel, it already destroyed three of our warships." Shakat's first officer stated.

Shakat already had realized that the Aliens' that were fighting for the cowards' humans were more powerful than any other known race bar first ones. But a single vessel daring to attack twenty-five top of the line Minbari war-cruisers was stupidity.

"Bring us about, this station can wait, fire all weapons on that ship." Shakat shouted.

Promptly all the Minbari vessels began turning around to face the new threat, but before they had had the chance of completing the maneuver, one more Sharlin and a Tinashi had vanished in a blaze of fire.

"All torpedoes were expended Captain, now we have no weapons left, phasers are still offline." The tactical officer said.

"Mr. Doohan how are we? Now would be a good time for the phasers to be operational." Kirk inquired the chief engineer.

"**We are trying Sir, but more than half of our systems had been shutdown or disassembled for repairs or maintenance, we were lucky the ship managed to get here in one piece." **The chief engineer replied.

"I understand that Mr. Doohan, but we are about to engage twenty-three enemy ships, and we have no weapons, so I suggest that you come up with something really quickly." Kirk out.

"**Aye, Capt'n, we're workin' as fast as we can."** The chief engineer said.

"Captain, to go against twenty-three enemy ships with no weapons is madness; I say that we should retreat until phasers are operational." The navigator beamed.

"Your opinion is dully noted Mr. Stiles, when this becomes a democracy I'll ask for your opinion."

Now twenty-three Minbari vessels firing every weapon they had had began trying to hit the still approaching Federation vessel.

"Forward shields at twelve percent, Captain." Tactical officer reported.

"Distance to the enemy?" Kirk asked, as smoke and sparks began filling the bridge.

"Three thousand kilometers, Captain." The Tactical officer replied.

Reverse course; change all power to the rear shields, as soon we out of their range match their speed. Also let's vent some plasma shall we."

"Aye, Captain." The helmsman acknowledged.

"Alyt, the enemy is running away, we have seriously damage it."

"Increase speed, don't let them escape, Shakat ordered."

But by much that the Minbari increased their speed, the apparently damage alien vessel seemed to be able to mach it.

"Your plan is working Captain; we draw their attention from the spacedock." The USS Monarch first officer stated.

**Minbari command ship.**

Eight of the nine members of the Grey council attentively were watching the ongoing battle and getting more nervous on each second that pass. The battle was not going well; to every way they look, Minbari vessels were disappearing.

"This is madness, who are these servants of darkness?" A member asked.

"It doesn't matter, in the end the light will always prevail, always has been and always will continue to be." Another member replied.

Another member was about to say something else but before that could happen a brief flash of light lit the dark room.

"Hello boys... and girl, is the battle against the humans being everything you wished for?"

"You, these minions of yours are not the humans, but regardless, even if we all perish today the darkness will not succeed." Delenn said.

"They are humans all right... let me shown it." Q said smiling and immediately in a flash of light a human appeared next to him.

**Several seconds before on board the Federation command ship. **

"Status report!" Admiral Paris commanded.

"The spacedock was seriously hit and is now defenceless, twelve more starships have arrived but casualties are being far superior to reinforcements, the main force of the aliens is about to reach Earth defences and sector 1A is weakening fast." Captain Riddick reported.

"Have the Ajax, Ahwahnee, Daedalus, Endeavour and the Drake to reinforce sector 1A, alpha wing initiate attack pattern omega five and..." Before Admiral Paris could finish the order it disappeared in a flash of light.

Everyone in the bridge for a second got shocked. Captain Riddick was the first to recover and immediately yelled." SHIELDS STATUS!"

"Shields at forty one percent, Captain." The tactical officer replied.

"How the hell did they manage to beam the Admiral, rotate shields frequencies randomly, order that all ships in the fleet do it also and find me their command ship, they are going to pay dearly for this." Riddick ordered as simultaneously inserted in a console near his chair admiral Paris' last commands.

**Presently on the Minbari command ship.**

"Where Am I?" A completely lost Admiral Owen Paris inquired.

"Welcome Admiral, sorry for the poor lighting but I'm certain you will get used to it, won't you?" A cheerful Q replied.

After quickly having looked around, Paris immediately focused is attention on the nine figures in the dark room, also having noticed the holographic display showing the ongoing battle.

"You are the Aliens attacking us, aren't you... why are you doing this, did we done anything that could cause offense to you?"

All of the gray council was appalled; a Human had just appeared in the Hart of the Minbari. But before the Minbari could do anything, Q in his unruffled manner began talking.

"He is quick isn't he?" Q said addressing the Minbari, but then turned to Paris "Not even Jean-Luc would have got it so fast and certainly not your brainless son, I really don't know why Kate puts up with him, are you sure you two are related?"

"You know Tom, have you done something to him? Who are you people?" A complete confused Admiral asked.

"You see, this why I like the humans they are fascinating and inquisitive." Q joked and then turned to Paris. "Don't you recognize me, Didn't Jean-Luc mentioned me? I'm very disappointed with him and I must tell him that the next time we meet."

"Are you talking about Captain Picard, why should he have mentioned you? Who are you?"

"Ah yes of course, is my appearance isn't it?" Q stated and in a flash of light his appearance completely change, now appeared as a human dressed with a custom like the Federation President. "Is this better?"

"Q, you are Q aren't you?" Paris immediately beamed.

"You see, didn't I tell you he was quick." Q addressed the speechless Minbari.

"You are the responsible for this attack aren't you, thousands of beings are dying each second and you are enjoying it." A very indignant Admiral Paris stated.

"Blablablablabla, just when I though you where interesting, I'm disappointed with you Owen." Q stated.

Paris ignored him and addressed the eight hooded figures in front of him. "This being is a trickster, whatever he told you isn't true, please stop this madness before is too late."

The Minbari didn't know what to say, then one stepped in and started talking, the voice was of a female. "Are you renouncing your dark Master?"

"What? I admit that he is powerful but no one in the Federation answers to him, we are free. Do you obey him?" Paris asked.

Delenn felt incredibly offended with the insinuation and immediately replied. "We only fight for the light, darkness is our enemy and you serve the darkness."

In the back Q was enjoying immensely the exchange of words.

"I already told you, the Federation serves no one." Paris replied.

"You have accepted his help, those vessels prove it." Delenn said.

But before Paris could tell anything, another member of the Grey council spoke. "Our main force is about to reach orbit of the human's homeworld, soon they will be of no consequence.

A cold chill run through Paris spine, if the planetary defenses could not stop the aliens the fault would be his.

Suddenly apparently dormant satellites awaken and a hail of orange beams began striking the approaching Minbari fleet. All the eight of the Grey council were hopeful that the attack on the humans' homeworld changed the heading that the battle was taking, but what happen next horrified them, of about hundred vessels that had reach orbit, in seconds all had been reduced to nothing more then debris.

Paris felt a tremendous relief, but a fierce war was still raging and Federation vessels still being destroyed, suddenly the enemy vessel where he was rocked violently and in the holographic display a Federation starship was shown coming towards them, In the main hull was written NCC 70637 USS Galaxy.

"Paris to Galaxy do you her me, Galaxy reply." But no response came.

TBC


End file.
